


One Hundred Percent Reason to Remember

by trinipedia



Category: Supernatural
Genre: AU, Big Bang Challenge, Bigbang2010, Challenge Response, F/M, Fanfiction, Incest, M/M, Sibling Incest, Slash, alternative universe
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-08-20
Updated: 2010-08-20
Packaged: 2018-09-15 17:55:57
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 9
Words: 49,509
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9249260
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/trinipedia/pseuds/trinipedia
Summary: What's the difference between love and lust? Castiel and Uriel have their own opinions about what's between the Winchester brothers, and each is determined to prove the other wrong. The true test comes in the form of multiple alternate scenarios which make one thing absolutely certain: Sam and Dean will always find each other, despite the circumstances in which they're placed. But is it love or lust?





	1. ~ Prologue ~

**Author's Note:**

> **Artist:** ****[](http://thruterryseyes.livejournal.com/profile)[thruterryseyes](http://thruterryseyes.livejournal.com/) [ART MASTERPOST](http://thruterryseyes.livejournal.com/18833.html)  
>   
>  **Disclaimer:**  we don't own anything, promise. Part III was inspired by some scene from Ten Inch Hero, Part VI was loosely inspired by a plot from Grey's Anatomy and Part VII was based on the song Jueves by La Oreja de Van Gogh. The title of fics and chapters come from the song Remember the Name by Fort Minor.

 

 

 

"You're completely missing the point, Castiel!" Uriel exclaims, waving his hands in the air, frustration plain on his face.  
  
"These-these- **humans** are fragile and weak, especially the Winchesters. They shouldn't be allowed to live, let alone represent us and **guide** us!"  
  
Castiel just stares at him.  
  
"We have to follow our orders, Uriel, even if we don't understand them or agree with them. The plan comes from Heaven, and that makes it just. We simply need to have faith."  
  
Uriel gapes at him.  
  
"How can you still say that, after what we've seen, after what has happened?!"  
  
Castiel sighs. "Dean Winchester is an important pawn in this war, and you know it. We can't waste him just because you don't agree with his actions."  
  
Uriel sneers. "Agree? **Agree**?! Castiel, that disgusting mud-monkey is lusting after his own **brother**! How **sick** is that?! We can't rely the world's fate **and** ours on the shoulders of such an impure creature!” He huffs and turns his back to Castiel.  
  
"We're just wasting precious time that we don't have. A holy warrior can't commit incest, that's unheard of!"  
  
"They haven't done anything like that," Castiel points out, and Uriel just rolls his eyes.  
  
"Maybe not **yet** , but they will, sooner or later. And I won't let this-"  
  
" **Enough**."  
  
Castiel's voice gets lower, dark and commanding, and Uriel feels a shiver running down his spine, as he turns towards him again.  
  
"Lust might not be condoned, but not the same can be said about love," Castiel adds, and Uriel blinks. Before he can say anything, though, Castiel goes on.  
  
"What’s between the Winchesters is-complicated. **Layered** , if you will. They only have each other to rely on, to believe in, and that's why they're stronger together. The feeling, the **bond** they created after all these years of sharing every minute of their lives is something rare and pure, to be protected."  
Uriel scratches the back of his neck, his jaw dropping in disbelief.  
  
"You **can't** be serious."  
  
Castiel arches an eyebrow. "I **am**."  
  
The angels stare at each other, without blinking, until Uriel breaks the moment by stepping closer.  
"Fine. Let's make a deal: give me the chance of showing you what's really inside these creatures' souls. I will test the **bond** between the Winchesters, and if it holds and turns out to be what you expect it to be, I will step back and help you. But if it doesn't..."  
  
Uriel's smile turns into a sickening grin. "If it doesn't, and I'm right, you'll let me **smite** them."  
  
Castiel looks at him, his head held high in defiance.  
  
"Fine."  


 

  
**TBC...**


	2. ~ I. 17% Skills ~

  
The office of the 67th precinct in New Orleans is quiet. Most desks are deserted, their owners having gone home already; there are a few officers still working at their desks, trying to finish up the day's paperwork on some incident or another. Detective Dean Winchester props his feet up on his own desk and leans back in his chair. The night may be almost over for some of the others, but he still has mounds of paperwork to look over, and, if he's successful, a thief to catch.  
  
The chief has put him in charge of a particular case that's been running for a while; there's this thief breaking and entering all over the precinct and no matter who they put on the case, no one can catch him. He doesn't have a calling card and there's really no way of proving that the thefts are related in any way, but Dean... well, Dean just knows.  
  
There are police reports scattered all over his desk, incidents over the past month and a half that seem like run-of-the-mill thefts to the untrained eye. Dean, however, has been looking at things like this for the majority of his career.  
  
All entry points are the same. The backdoor in places that had them and a kitchen window in those that didn't. The lock would be neatly picked on the doors, screens slashed with a small knife on the windows. Ignoring the fact that most B & E's used the same methods, there was something uncanny about the fact that there'd been no thefts in this part of the city (barring the normal sporadic ones) for the better part of a year, and then, suddenly, all of this.  
  
He leafs through the papers again, searching for anything he may have missed and making notes on a small pad at the corner of his desk.  
  
Detective Dean Winchester is going to catch this guy one way or another, if it's the last thing he does as an officer of the law. 

 

  
The lock on the door clicks, and Sam grins to himself.  
  
It's almost too easy for someone as used to alarms and locks as he is to force his way inside the house.  
He's been working in his father's shop for as long as he can remember, and he’s installed all sorts of doors and locks, secured windows and so on.  
  
It's child's play for him.  
  
He steps inside as stealthily as he can; he doesn't want to scare the poor widow Phoebe and it's not like he's really there to steal anything, after all.  
  
He moves around the living room, looking at the widow's duck collection and chuckling at the awful pictures of her dog, which looks more like a pig.  
  
Without noticing, he steps too close to the living room wall, and as he opens the cabinet containing the silver cutlery one of his elbows unlocks the alarmed window.  
  
Sam only hears a low hiss, but he knows quite well what it means.  
  
The alarm is connected to the police station; they'll be swarming the place in less than five minutes. A smug grin appears on his face.  
  
_And the game begins._

  


  
The sound of the alarms down the hall going off shatters Dean's concentration. He rushes down to the bank of monitors and watches the little red light blink for a minute - burglary alarm.  
  
He grabs his jacket off his chair on the way back through, makes sure his gun is loaded and heads out to his car. There are others on the scene; he knows as soon as he starts up the scanner he's installed in the car's stereo system. The report's going off like crazy. He just hopes he isn't too late, that the thief sticks around long enough for Dean to see the look on his face as he's being arrested. 

 

  
"There he is!" a policeman exclaims, pointing towards one of the tree in the yard of the house, and sure enough, Sam's there, hanging from the highest branch.  
  
"Hi, guys!" He greets them cheerfully, waving a hand. A couple of cops even wave back.  
  
Sam is a carefree, easygoing guy, and many of them even questioned the need of displaying forces this way for a small apartment burglar who usually doesn't even steal anything to begin with.  
  
From the central office, they've been adamant: he disrupts the peace and breaks inside private citizens' houses; hence he must be secured to justice, no matter how nice a thief he is.  
  
Whatever, no one has ever been able to catch him, anyway.  
  
Sam's eyes shift from one car to another, but-  
  
"Where's your detective?" he asks, and he's aware he probably sounds disappointed.  
  
"Too busy with bigger fish to fry, I guess," he answers himself before any of them can.  
  
He'd like to stick around and wait, but one of the policemen is approaching with a ladder, and he takes it as his cue to leave.  
  
"It was fun, guys, thanks!" he shouts, before disappearing with a back-flip that has him landing on the backside of the roof, away from the lights.  
  
Sam carefully jumps from one roof to the next, and only once he deems he’s put enough distance between him and the police does he dare stepping back onto the street.  
  
He takes off the black overalls he was wearing and the cap he used to hide his face, shakes his mop of brown hair like a wet dog, and walks home, his head hanging low and a bitter taste in his mouth.

 

  
The red and blue lights are already flashing by the time he pulls up, slides in next to a patrol car and assesses the scene. They're talking to a woman just outside the door; her hair is in curlers and she holds her robe closed around herself. She looks horror-stricken.  
  
Sighing, he climbs out of the car.  
  
"Got anything?" He asks the nearest officer, who's making notes to put in a report.  
  
"He got away again. Worst part was, they just sat there and let him go, didn't even give chase." The guy scowls over his shoulder to the huddle of cops hanging back, watching. "So no, we got nothing. Not even a description."  
  
"Damnit," Dean swears, grinding his teeth together.  
  
"Can I ask a question, Detective?"  
  
Dean doesn't answer, and the guy takes that as initiative. "Why do you care so much? It's child's play; he never does anything harmful, hardly even steals anything. Why do you want to catch him so much?"  
  
"Because," Dean sighs, rubs at his temples. He's in a bad mood already, and the bastard had to come play with him some more. Cat and mouse, only the mouse was Speedy Gonzales and he felt as inept as Tom. "I can't catch him."  
  
"You want to catch him just because you haven’t been able to yet?” The officer seems amused, but keeps it to himself. Dean grunts and gets back in his car, turns the engine and speeds back to the station. No one in this part of the city will pull him over, anyway; they'd know the sound of his black ’67 Impala from blocks away. And if it was slightly against regulation, who cared?  
  
Dean knew that there was something here. Paranoia, whatever you wanna call it, something was up with this thief. No one breaks and enters without intending to steal anything. He'd have another report to add to his collection in the morning.

 

  
When Dean heads to work the next day, his head is pounding. He grinds his teeth together and pulls out his file on the mysterious thief, only to have to drop it next moment when he's called into the Chief's office.  
  
"Why haven't you caught your thief yet?" The Chief is a short, fat man with a shiny bald head who spits when he talks and even more when he yells. Which is what he's currently doing.  
  
"Sir, I didn't get the call until there was already a squad dispatched. I didn't get there in time, I guess."  
  
"So your men let him get away? Why didn't you give them orders to catch him?!"  
  
Dean sighs. "I'm sorry, sir. I'll issue those orders right away."  
  
"You know, Winchester, I put you on this case specifically because I know you can do it. You've been in the force for long enough to know the ins and outs and how to deal with people. I don't want to be disappointed again, or it'll be back to strictly desk work for you. Got it?"  
  
"Yes, sir." Dean tries very hard not to look pissed, but he only holds out as long as he gets back to where his department sits, in the corner of the precinct.  
  
"Give every squad orders to catch any thief they can get their hands on," he grumbles to the first officer he comes across, and slinks back to his desk. He shrugs his jacket off, loosens his tie at first, then gives up and takes it off, sets it on the corner of his desk. The Chief can deal with the dress code violation. Shouldn’t care anyway if Dean can catch the damn thief.  
  
He sighs, and opens the new folder on top of the pile on his desk. It’s last night’s report; the woman swears that the thief accosted her dog, Cyrano. There’s a picture of Cyrano featured, wearing bows on both of his ears.  
  
Dean thinks it’s got to be one of the ugliest dogs he’s ever seen. He’s halfway through a very detailed description of the dog’s pedigree (the woman saw fit to include it, maybe to add gravity to the situation) when he's interrupted by one of the secretaries on the front desk.  
  
"Detective?" she says, cautiously, stopping a few feet short of her desk. She's seen what kind of mood he's in and is trying not to get on his bad side. Smart woman.  
  
"Yes?" He says, drops the report and tries not to look too menacing. She's fairly pretty, and he likes to have his resources.  
  
"There's a... there's a man here to see you. He says he needs to talk to you in private, that he might have some info for a case you're working on."  
  
Dean's on his feet before she finishes the sentence, shrugging past her to one of the small conference rooms off to the side of the main area of the building. "Send him in."  
  
He waits there for a while, tapping his fingers against the faux wood table, before the door opens and a homeless guy steps in.  
  
The guy's gaze is skittish and nervous, and it flashes around the room, as if to situate the closest exit in case he has to bolt.  
  
In the end he clenches his hands against his chest, hidden under a dirty, torn shirt which has surely seen better days, and clears his throat.  
  
He looks at his feet; a great part of his face is hidden under long, greasy bangs, as he bites his lower lip uncomfortably.  
  
"Look, officer-" he starts, his voice unsure and hoarse "I shouldn't be here. I mean, you bash people like me. It was a mistake, I'm sorry."  
  
He steps back and turns towards the door, reaching for the knob with trembling fingers.  
  
As he's about to reach it, though, he clenches his fist, swallows noisily and turns towards Dean again.  
  
"I've seen him," he mutters quickly, "the thief. I'm sure he was him. He was pacing suspiciously around a house on the outskirts of town, surveying the area. Then he took his cell phone out and called someone, telling him or her where the security system was placed and how to get around it, and then he assured that he was going to break in at 9 pm tonight."  
  
Now that he's done talking, the man starts shaking, and his eyes look wide and terrified behind the curtain of brown hair.  
  
"Can-can I go?" he asks tentatively.  
  
Jackpot.  
  
Suddenly, Dean's happier than he's been all day. "You can go in a second. First, though. Where is this house, exactly? I need to know so we can take care of the problem." He explained it slowly, trying not to look at the homeless man too closely or freak him out. "You aren't in any trouble," he assured, fishing a small notepad out of an inner pocket of his jacket and looking in the guy's general direction expectantly.  
  
The guy stutters out an address, nodding to himself all the time as if to confirm that he's telling the truth.  
  
"Are you going to hurt him, officer?" he asks in the end. “I mean, he looked like a nice enough kid," he explains.  
  
Typical: they're both outcasts, so it's normal for them to look out for one another. Who knows why the thief does what he does, after all? There could be a million reasons.  
  
"Oh, we aren't going to hurt him." Dean doesn't even feel guilty for lying. "We're just going to stop him from stealing anything, help him if he needs it. That sort of thing. Thanks for the info; we've been looking to help this guy for a while."  
  
And yeah, he's aware that a two-year-old wouldn't buy that load of crap, but he can try.  
  
"You can go now, if you want. I'll make sure you remain anonymous."  
  
The man nods vehemently.  
  
"I'd like that. Yeah."  
  
He walks quickly out of the station, not before throwing a sidelong glance at Dean and murmuring "good luck", so low that he’s not even sure the detective actually heard it.

 

  
Dean doesn't tell anyone about it. At promptly 8:45 that night, he pulls up outside the address on the outskirts of New Orleans completely alone.  
  
He checks his clip, makes sure he's loaded, and waits.  
  
At promptly 9:15, Dean realizes that he's probably been had. There's no activity inside the house; the lights aren’t even on. There isn't a car in the driveway. He doesn't even know if the house is occupied. He's about to speed away when he realizes that he should probably check inside. In case the robbery's going on anyway and the thief just doesn't know how to set a watch right.  
  
Yeah, he should totally go check.  
  
He shuts the car door quietly and crosses the lawn as quickly as possible, clicking the safety off his gun. He tries the knob and finds it, curiously enough, wide open. Dean steps inside cautiously.  
  
There is no furniture. It's completely empty, and it throws him for a minute.  
  
Still, he has to check.  
  
He walks through the house, rounding each door frame like he's in CSI or something, and finally comes to the conclusion that someone is clearly playing with him.  
  
There's one last room. He rounds the door frame, tries to look menacing, and what he sees makes him drop his gun.  
  
The room is empty, just as the rest of the house, except for a huge bed that fills almost all the available space.  
  
The sheets are burgundy, and there's a weirdly enticing scent in the air. What’s shocking the detective is probably the person on the bed, though.  
  
He's young, quite built, with long, brown hair disheveled and unruly but that still manage to look incredibly soft. His hazel eyes are open wide and filled with unshed tears, as almost half of his face is covered by a dark blue gag, preventing him from thinking.  
  
His long arms are tied at the bedpost, and he pulls ineffectively at the metal handcuffs keeping him in place, producing an echoing clinging sound as his cheeks flush.  
  
And the guy has a very good reason for being embarrassed: he’s bare-ass naked. His knees are pulled tight against his chest in order to save what little is left of his dignity, but it does the exact opposite; he’s completely exposed, open for anyone who walks in the door to see.  
  
  
The effort of curling in a ball makes his ass muscles clench, and even if the night isn’t really cold, the exertion has covered his tanned skinned with a thin layer of sweat.  
  
He shouts something unintelligible from behind the gag, and his gaze focuses on the detective.  
  
And whoa, that is absolutely the last thing Dean thought he'd see. It takes him a few moments to recover higher brain function, but when he does, he takes a deep breath and picks up his gun. He hurries over to the bed and starts to try to remove the handcuffs. "Who did this to you?" he asks, focusing entirely on getting the lock on the handcuffs picked and not how beautiful the guy looks all stretched out and vulnerable like this.  
  
It's at least three minutes before he realizes that he hasn't un-gagged him yet.  
  
_Focus._  
  
The edges of the dark blue gag bite into the kid's tanned skin, pulls his mouth open at the edges, and Dean's dick twitches in his uniform pants.  
  
Oh god no. He's a highly-trained professional. He will not let this get to him.  
  
He unties the gag and tosses it to the side. "Can you tell me who did this to you?" he asks before the kid can get a word in edgewise.  
  
As soon as the tie is removed, the guy starts snapping his jaw, and then licks repeatedly his dry lips.  
  
"I don't know," he says, slightly panting, as he keeps pulling at his still blocked wrists, huffing in frustration when he doesn't succeed in breaking free.  
  
“He came through the window and caught my by surprise,” he nods toward said window on the other side of the room, gaping open. “I was sleeping.”  
  
The guy seems to relax a little, now that the detective is next to him, and he finally lets his legs drop, stretching and popping his back with a grimace.  
  
"Who knew this position would be so uncomfortable?" he mutters, as he rolls his shoulders.  
  
His muscles twitch under his slick skin and his biceps contract as he tries once more to get the cuffs undone.  
  
"How did you get here, officer?" he asks then, his voice filled with something akin to awe, as he lays one leg on the bed and his foot rests casually against Dean's thigh.  
  
"That isn't important." Dean clears his throat and tries to ignore the weight of the guy's foot on his thigh. This whole focusing thing, though? Not working out so well. He doesn't realize he's watching, but the muscles moving under the guy's skin, the way he flexes and stretches?  
  
Yeah, Dean's totally there.  
  
Only he can't be, because he's a _professional_.  
  
He clears his throat again, shifts his weight awkwardly. "Are you sure you didn't get a good look at your attacker? And what's your name?"  
  
The guy licks his lips once more.  
  
"I'm sorry, I didn't see him." He slowly shakes his head, “As I told you, I was sleeping, so the light was off."  
  
"And yes, of course it's important," he adds, after a moment, his tone shifting and turning low and seductive. "Because I have to show you my appreciation somehow, now; you saved me, after all. Who knows who could have come through that door, right?"  
  
He winks at Dean, and grins.  
  
"I'm Sam. I'd offer you my hand, but--" he shakes his handcuffed wrists, chuckling.  
  
Then, without warning, he hooks his foot around the detective's thigh and pulls, making him lose his balance and fall on him.  
  
"There, isn't this better?" Sam whispers, his mouth so close to Dean's face that the detective can feel his warm breath against his cheek.  
  
Dean groans inwardly.  
  
_Professional. Be professional. Be---_  
  
"I am a professional." He says weakly, but _oh_ does it feel good just here. And fuck, he can't even pretend anymore. His dick obviously approves of this shift of position; his erection tents the front of his uniform pants and there's no way Sam can't feel that. But Sam's cock is thick against his hip, and he needs to be chasing this thief, not fucking a victim. _Focusfocusfocus..._  
  
Sam smirks as he feels Dean's erection against his groin.  
  
"Is that your gun or are you just happy to see me, officer?" he asks, mockingly, as he shifts against Dean's body. The sweat is now running down his face and pooling on his upper lip, so he shakes his head, trying to free the locks of hair sticking against his forehead.  
  
The temperature in the room is rising rapidly, and Sam feels like he's on fire.  
  
Sam's forehead glistens with sweat. It's kind of distracting. Muttering, Dean reaches for the gag, undoes the knot and goes to wipe Sam's forehead.  
  
Only now he realizes that the gag is in fact a tie, and its exact color of dark blue is oddly familiar.  
  
He glances at it, all crumpled, wet with spit and tears, and frowns, then turns it and notices the weirdly shaped stain on the back of it.  
  
"Is that..." Obviously there's no reason why it would be, but that's the association he makes and his job has thought me to trust his guts.  
  
"Is that my tie?" He looks back at Sam, raises an eyebrow, and waits for an explanation.  
  
Sam's jaw drops, his eyes shift and then he lowers his head, hiding his face behind his long bangs.  
"Er... I..." he stutters, as his cheeks get pale. He quickly turns his face towards the window, away from Dean, as if he's afraid that Dean sees the answer on his face and he won't like it.  
  
For a moment, Dean can't place where he's seen the kid before. He thinks back to when he noticed his tie wasn't on his desk, where he'd thrown it that morning after the meeting with the Chief. It could have easily have been any of the officers on the case, but Dean knew it wasn't. Then he remembers the homeless guy, the informant, and it clicks. "You..." he starts. “You impersonated a homeless guy to get me here? Why?!" He scrambles back off the bed, takes a few steps back toward the doorway. "What's this about?"  
  
Sam swallows, hard, as he keeps staring at the wallpaper as if the design was particularly fascinating.  
After a few moments of silence, as he can still feel Dean's eyes digging hole at his chest, he sighs and slowly turns his eyes on him, but he still can’t look at his face.  
  
"I just-I wanted to talk to you," he stutters. "I tried it so many times, but you never pay any attention to me. I knew that you would have come for _him_." He spits the pronoun out with a bitter tone, as a regretful expression flickers on his face.  
  
Dean crosses his arms over his chest and ignores the fact that he's still rock-hard. He's about to ask why Sam wants to talk to him so much, what could be so important that he'd lie to him and distract him from his case, but he thinks better of it. The next question that bubbles up is how Sam knows him anyway; before this morning, he'd never seen the kid. But that's too closely related to the other question and it doesn't matter, anyway. "Okay," he says, tries to be as stern as he can while talking to a man who's completely vulnerable and tied to the bed in front of him. "I'm here now. Talk."  
  
Sam blushes furiously, so fast that he's afraid he's going to self-combust before he can get a single word out. Then he licks his lower lip and starts talking, trying to be as vague as he can, because he's dreading the moment Dean will finally understand what's going on.  
  
"I've-seen you around," he admits, voice shaking, and damn, it's so _not_ comfortable declaring his undying love as he's cuffed to the bed.  
  
He probably should have planned this better, but after the previous night, when Dean didn't come to the widow's house, the fear of him getting tired of the cat and mouse game and just moving on had been like a punch to the gut.  
  
"I tried to approach you in any possible way I could think of, but nothing. I was invisible," he continues, a little softer as he remembers. He recalls bumping into Dean at the mall, spilling his coffee on him, picking up a zucchini that fell from his basket at the supermarket.  
  
Every single time he only got a polite, blank smile and a curt nod, before the officer walked out of his life again. Sam snorts.  
  
"Now I can see it was stupid, and I'm sorry. I simply couldn't think of any other way you'd be concentrated on me long enough for me to actually speak to you."  
  
He takes a deep breath and murmurs, “I-I’m in love with you.”  
  
Something wells up in Dean's throat at that, something that's a lot like a red flag. There's something not quite right about this picture and Dean doesn't give himself another half-second to think about Sam's admission before he voices it. "So you let the thief I'm after tie you up and leave you here?" And yeah, it's not like the thief is dangerous as far as Dean can tell, but it's the principle.  
  
Sudden, irrational concern rears its ugly head. "You could have been killed! You shouldn't..." Shouldn't what? Shouldn't have done this, shouldn't have let himself be interested in Dean? Oh god. He can't even finish his statement. And then he feels like a complete asshole for being so absorbed in work that he didn't notice running into the same guy several times over. "It's dangerous," he finally settles for, clearing his throat. "You shouldn't have let him do this to you just because you knew I'd rush to the scene."  
  
Sam narrows his eyes; he can’t believe this. Even after his declaration, even after everything he has been going through to get to Dean, he still-  
  
"Dammit, Dean! It's not dangerous! It wasn't dangerous, for me, and it will never be, simply I _am_ the motherfucking thief, have been all along!” Sam doesn't realize he has been shouting until he can feel his throat burn once he finishes the sentence.  
He clenches his jaw so tight his teeth hurt. "It's me," he repeats, lower, refusing once more to make eye contact.  
  
Dean feels the familiar, numbing rage take over him. Every time they've rushed to help someone, some victim of a burglary, every time he's had to take shit from his boss because he couldn't catch this guy... it was personal, now. Sam was just toying with him? So quickly he doesn't register the movement, he walks around the side of the bed, catching hold of Sam's jaw and wrenching it upwards forcefully. Forcing him to meet his gaze. He leans down close, glaring with every ounce of anger he can summon.  
  
"It's been you, all this time?" he hisses, and feels Sam shrink back. Still, he doesn't let go.  
  
Sam freezes, terrified. He expects Dean to punch him, and God knows he deserves it, but he's not going to let it happen without saying everything he came to say.  
  
He swallows again, and nods slowly.  
  
"The first time I met you, I was barely 18," he starts, voice shaking as he tries to keep it even. “A few friends and me went and got beer, you know, graduation and all that. We just wanted to do something crazy, break the law. Somehow, I stayed back and you caught me.” Sam's cheeks flush.  
  
"You could have taken me to the station, or called my parents and had them kick my ass, but you didn't. You sat next to me, popped a can of beer open and gave it to me, saying that if I had to get wasted, it was better if I had adult supervision as I did. I took a sip and almost puked right then and there, because the taste? _Yuck_." He chuckles.  
  
"You laughed, and I found myself lost in the sound. Then you stood up, patted my shoulder and told me that I was a great kid and you didn't want to meet me again like that, because you knew I could do so much better with my life."  
  
Dean's words that night had warmed Sam's heart, showing him that was possible to get to others without the long-ass words the school counselor used. His easygoing attitude, his smile, the way he seemed to know just what to say made Sam think about a person like Dean trying to talk a suicidal man into giving life a second chance, and that's when Sam decided he wanted to be a psychologist.  
  
He wanted to help people, too. "So, I worked my ass off," he continues, clenching his fists "I studied and graduated and did my best to become the man I thought you wanted, then I came back looking for you." Sam lowers his eyes, not noticing that Dean's hold on his jaw has loosened, and sighs.  
  
"But no matter how hard I tried, you never noticed me. At first I thought it was because you already belonged to someone else, and if it had been true I would have let you go, because your happiness it's what matters the most to me, you know? But you weren't." He tortures his lower lip with his teeth.  
  
"No boyfriends or girlfriends, not even friends, as far as I've been able to see. Only your job catches your attention, thieves, murders, crimes. That's your life. And since I don't have it in me what it takes to kill another human being, I turned into a thief."  
  
Sam blinks and looks back at Dean, grimacing as he attempts to shrug.  
  
"And here you are, finally, with me...just to prove I was right."  
  
Dean's grip goes slack on Sam's jaw and he takes a step back. He's a little touched, and little weirded out, but he's not stupid: he recognizes that what Sam says is true. He isn't sorry about it; rather, he's kind of proud of himself for being able to focus on one sole thing. But on the other hand, how could he have not noticed this? All of this, happening for him, right in front of him, and he'd never even risked a second glance.  
  
"I..." he's struck speechless for a second, which hardly ever happens.  
  
And even if Sam is the thief he's been pursuing, that just means that he's done his job better than he thought he could. That side of it, the side that nags him about his duty, is satisfied.  
  
He sighs, drops his head and sits next to Sam on the bed. It doesn't escape his notice that Sam's still naked, and his arms have to be starting to burn pulled back like that, but he doesn't complain. Sam just watches him with his big hazel eyes, completely laid bare for him.  
  
"I remember," he starts, and then doesn't know where to go with it because he isn't used to this. "I remember that summer. That used to be my thing. You know, catching kids and trying to set 'em right."  
  
He snorts, looks out the window without seeing it. "Not long after I caught you, that same month, even, I got a call on the scanner. I was on some domestic thing when I heard about a robbery in progress and recognized my address."  
  
"I completely lost my head, abandoned the first call and rushed over, but it was already done. Even though I was the first one on the scene, the thief made off with a bunch of our stuff and left my father on the kitchen floor with a fatal stab-wound. So yeah," Dean clears his throat, tears himself out of the images flashing before his eyes and looks down at Sam. "I'm still trying to set stuff right, you know? I barely even give myself time to think about anything else."  
  
He half-turns and cups Sam's face, ignoring the way his stomach jumps as Sam leans in to it. He's suddenly filled with the urge to make it right, to make Sam think he's a little bit less of an asshole.  
  
Dean's palms are rough, like those of a man used to manual labor, and Sam can't help craving the contact.  
He closes his eyes for an instant, kissing the pad of Dean's thumb that's absentmindently brushing his lower lip. "I'm sorry," he murmurs "God, Dean I'm so sorry."  
  
And he knows there's nothing he can say or do to make Dean feel better. He could offer himself to him, once more, but he's not as arrogant as to think that will be enough.  
  
"I've wanted to go back to that summer so many times, you know," he adds, as an afterthought. "I kept thinking that maybe I missed something, and if I've had the chance of living that night again maybe- maybe you'd stay."  
  
He offers Dean a small smile. "But now I see that we can't go back. We could, however, move on? Maybe?" he asks, his voice slightly hopeful, even if he does his best for it not to be.  
  
He knows how crushed he'll be if Dean rejects him now that everything has been laid- literally -bare in front of him.  
  
Dean is at a complete loss for what to do. He wants... god, he wants, but Sam is not only a criminal, he's been following him for the last few years. Idolizing him, looking up to him, hoping he could be with him. Dean isn't sure he can live up to that. He continues absently touching Sam's face, but he looks away; there's a car on the road outside, throwing the beam of its headlights across the wall.  
  
He remembers, suddenly, where they are. "We're, uh. We're squatting in someone's house." He frowns. "We should go somewhere." He doesn't want to let Sam out of his sight, now, even if he wants to think things over. They could go back to his place; it's big and empty enough. It would work.  
  
Sam wonders briefly if his cheeks are going to stay permanently flushed, seeing as he has never blushed this much in his entire life.  
  
"Er, actually..." he coughs uncomfortably. "This is my house."  
  
He hangs his head in shame because he knows how observant Dean is and therefore he expects him to ask.  
Still, a little part of him hopes he won't question him, even if it's probably just wishful thinking.  
  
Dean blinks, "But there's no furniture. It's completely bare except for this room." He frowns. There's a possibility that Sam's also crazy. After all, chasing Dean for all of these years? It'd take a special type of person to keep that up. Even at that, the whole _chasing Dean_ thing was a special kind of crazy in and of itself.  
  
Sam was either crazy or sweet or completely hopeless, but Dean hoped he wasn't crazy.  
  
Sam sighs.  
  
"It's empty for three good reasons. First, because I came back from college less than two months ago and I've been too busy with looking for a job during the day and trying to get your attention by night to go couch hunting. Second, because I know how good of a cop you are, so I expected you to shut me in a cell and throw away the key soon, which would have make the purchase of furniture pretty pointless. And finally, third..."  
  
His eyes shift on the side before he thinks _what the hell_ and goes for it.  
  
"Third because I hoped we'd fall in love and you'd come back here with me, sooner or later, meaning that we would have to choose how to decorate the house together. Didn't want for it to be a house you'd hate to live in." Sam groans, as he lays his head back.  
  
"I knew it was a bad idea to do this," he mutters, "but you were supposed to be too busy taking care of my bare ass to notice my bare house."  
  
He huffs. "I guess I didn't take into proper account how _obsessed_ you are with your job."  
  
Dean's face grows hot, and he's so unaccustomed to the feeling that it takes him completely by surprise. He's flattered; really he is, now that he's getting passed the weirded-out stage. This guy... this guy is serious, isn't he? Acting like a twelve-year-old girl and all, he's still been waiting for Dean all this time.  
  
And yeah, Dean doesn't think he can live up to the expectations, but he's willing to try. It's the least he can do, considering how awful he's been to this point. Sam deserves something better.  
  
Needless to say, taking care of Sam's bare ass sounds like a really, really awesome idea right about now.  
Dean lets out a breath he didn't know he was holding. "Well," he starts, watching the metal of the handcuffs dig into Sam's wrists. "Pot, meet kettle." He chuckles. Sam looks like he's afraid he's going to get punched; his face has turned the color red usually associated with tomatoes.  
  
Dean does pull back, watches the way Sam flinches, before he reassumes his position and leans in close to Sam's mouth. "I'm not going to hurt you because you're hopelessly, stupidly in love with me," he mutters, gives Sam a chaste kiss and pulls back incrementally again. "Not unless you want me to." He feels like he should smirk, but Sam's eyes are closed and it would probably be a moot point at this angle anyway.  
  
Even if the kiss is over too soon, Sam can feel his mouth tingle. He slowly lifts his eyelids, and tries to focus his glassy stare on Dean's face, which is so close that he almost gets cross-eyed.  
  
"Uh," he whispers, in awe. "You have freckles."  
  
He leans in to kiss them, but the cuffs pull him back and he only manages to brush the tip of Dean's nose. Dean'll let that one slide, for now.  
  
He lingers just out of reach for another moment, waits until Sam makes a frustrated noise and lets himself fall back before he swoops in and kisses him. Really kisses him, presses inside until Sam's mouth opens for him and _takes_ what he's been so blatantly offered. But he can't do it like this; he wants to feel Sam's hands on him. He skims his fingertips up the insides of Sam's arms, loops a finger under the chain that links the handcuffs together. It's pulled tight with tension, and Dean yanks on it, can feel the edges digging into Sam's wrists.  
  
He breaks away, breathing hard. "Want you out of these," he breathes.  
  
Sam whines as he tries to chase Dean's mouth and once again he can't.  
  
His cock has immediately recovered its interest in what's happening, and even if Sam feels still a little self conscious, he can't afford to be shy. This might be his only chance to be with Dean, because starting from tomorrow he won't be the elusive thief anymore, but just a guy; a normal one, at that.  
  
He pulls at the cuffs and then turns towards the windowsill, where he had put the key, and his eyes widen when he realizes that the key’s not there anymore.  
  
"The-the key-" he stutters, staring helplessly at the curtains that wave mockingly at him in the night breeze.  
  
"The key?" Dean repeats and follows Sam's eyes to the table beside the bed. "Where is it?" He tilts his head this way and that, looking for a glint of moonlight off metal.  
  
Sam swallows.  
  
"It's gone. I left it on the windowsill and..." he shrugs as best he can, and arches an eyebrow. "Looks like I can't help being a dork and embarrass myself again and again in front of you," he mutters, pouting.  
  
"Damn," Dean mutters. He could take the time to pick them, but he doubts his hands would stay still for long enough to get it done. Sam's just too damn distracting. "Looks like you'll just have to _take it_." He hisses these last words against Sam's ear, draws the lobe into his mouth and tugs.  
  
Sam moans, loud, and he's suddenly grateful the only house he has been able to afford is basically in the countryside.  
  
Not like he would care to wake up the entire neighborhood, anyway.  
  
He starts to work on his clothes, tossing his shirts aside and toeing off his shoes. Groaning, he stands up and works his belt off, undoes the button on his pants and pushes them down. He can feel Sam's eyes on him, watching him, pupils almost swallowing his irises. Suddenly, there's no time; he wants Sam now, has to have him now or he'll explode with it.  
  
Sam lets out a feral growl, urging him when he’s not quick enough, and for a minute it steals Dean’s breath and he raggedly draws air into his lungs before climbing back onto the bed, as naked as Sam now, and pushes his legs apart so he can settle between them.  
  
Sam feels his cock leaking, and he almost sobs when Dean is finally laying between his thighs.  
  
He puts his legs around Dean's waist and pulls him closer still, sighing in pleasure when their erections slide against each other, then he arches his back in the attempt to increase the friction.  
  
The need to touch, bite and lick is overwhelming, and the inability to do so is driving him insane.  
  
With Sam's legs around him, Sam's moans ringing in his ear and Sam's cock sliding against his, Dean is understandably distracted from the main objective for a few moments. He throws his head back, wrapped up in the sensation, and a ragged, feral growl tears from his own throat. His hips buck forward, rubbing himself all over Sam like a cat in heat, and it's only the lack of the delicious friction he wants that reminds him that, oh, there's something else he could do.  
  
Dean trails his fingers back behind Sam's balls, searches for the spot he needs, and without warning, his fingers slip _inside_ Sam. He makes a sound he won't ever admit to and realizes that Sam must have done this himself, must have stretched his spine and opened himself in anticipation for Dean. With all the other things that the guy's done for him, waiting for him, it seems a small thing, but Dean unconsciously thrusts forward with the knowledge that Sam was confident enough to think Dean wouldn't be able to focus with himself so displayed.  
  
Dean makes his way inside of his body and Sam mewls and pats himself mentally on the back for being prepared.  
  
Dean doesn't want to examine what that says about him. He slides another finger in, testing, then tries a third, but there's no resistance but slick, wet heat and he can't stand it anymore. He has to be just _there_.  
  
"I didn't-" he pants as he grabs the bedpost in order to be able to push towards Dean's fingers "I didn't want to wait once you were here.”  
  
Sam thrashes his head from side to side, and knows he's not going to last long if Dean keeps playing with him this way.  
  
"I'm ready, I'm ready, Dean, goddammit!" he hisses through clenched teeth, "I'm ready, fuck me, come on."  
_I've been waiting almost 7 years for this._  
  
Dean pulls his fingers away, groaning at the way Sam's body clings to him. He wraps a hand around Sam's cock, jutting up between them and leaking slightly, and lines himself up.  
  
He's always been good at taking orders.  
  
He knows he won't be able to take it slow, and Sam obviously needs this just as much as he does, so Dean positions himself and pushes forward with one long, sinuous movement, keeps pushing until his balls hit Sam's ass and he bottoms out. And here, he has to breathe. He collapses forward, lays his head over Sam's heart and breathes, trying not to move. If he moves, he'll lose it right here before they even get started, and that definitely won't live up to Sam's lofty expectation for him.  
  
"Fuck," he grinds out as he tries to adjust.  
  
It's a few minutes before he's confident the he won't blow his load if he breathes crooked; Sam writhes underneath him, bucks up into his lax hand, and he wants to be able to help with that but he's a bit busy clamping down on his control.  
  
Then, he takes a deep breath and starts to move.  
  
Sam loses his control as Dean breaches his body.  
  
He will remember this night forever, whatever the outcome, but he'll remember it all in a weird, detached way. It's like he's out of his body, watching Dean giving it to him as hard as he can.  
  
He can see his ass clenching around Dean's cock, as Dean tries to keep his grip on the situation, but that's not what he wants.  
  
He wants Dean to lose it, just as he has.  
  
He wants to see him as free and as lost as Sam has been since he has heard Dean laugh for the first time.  
With a snappy movement of his hips, he pushes Dean away, turns around and gets on his knees.  
He turns his head and winks at Dean, wriggling his hips.  
  
"Show me what you've got, _Officer_ " he whispers, seductively, trying to put all of his weight on his elbows, offering himself even more shamelessly to Dean's hungry eyes.  
  
Dean makes a protesting sound as he loses contact with Sam's body, but it turns into a moan as he sees what Sam's doing. It's got to be painful, chain pulled tight and crossed over his wrists, but Sam's wriggling his hips and Dean would like to care, but he can't bring himself to. In that moment, all that exists is his throbbing cock and Sam's welcoming ass. He chokes off a growl as he moves behind him, sucks a mark to the top of his spine and enters him again in one swift movement.  
  
He braces himself on one arm, attempts to reach around with the other, but Sam does this twisting thing with his hips that hits every single nerve in Dean's body at once. He yelps in surprise as he's pulled in deeper with Sam's ass tightening around him like a vice.  
  
Sweat runs down his neck from the effort of not fucking him with everything he's got, and he tries to remember why exactly he isn't. Higher brain function eludes him and Dean pulls out until only the head of his dick is breaching Sam's hole, and drives forward with all of his weight.  
  
Dean is still holding back, Sam can feel it in his trembling fingers pressing on his hips so hard he'll probably have bruises tomorrow, and the though makes him dizzy with happiness.  
  
Dean's marks. Sam feels tears pooling in his eyes, but he pushes them back.  
  
Now's so not the right moment to be melodramatic; he has Dean now, there's no need to think about when he will not have him anymore, right?  
  
He pushes back, meeting Dean's thrusts one by one, before letting out a frustrated groan.  
  
"I'm not a fucking girl, Dean," he hisses. "Fuck me like you mean it, dammit! Didn't you say you'd hurt me if I asked you to?"  
  
And he knows he's playing with fire, but he has never wanted to get burned as bad as he wants it now.  
  
At that, Dean stops moving altogether. He grins against Sam's spine and licks up the sweat that's pooled there. His next thrust is deliberately slow, dragging along Sam's insides incrementally, and it even drives Dean crazy. "Is that you asking me to?" he asks, smug, in Sam's ear. He's fucking gorgeous strung out like this, desperate for it, moving underneath him like a livewire.  
  
The effort of staying still is killing him, but it's worth it to hear the sounds Sam makes and how he begs for it.  
  
Sam's chuckle comes out broken and breathless. "You're such a dick," he mutters, clenching his ass muscles around Dean's cock. "I want to feel you for days; I want to come so hard I pass out. I want it to be worth a lifetime."  
  
And if his voice shakes a little on the last words, he hopes Dean won't notice.  
  
"Do you want me to beg?" he asks instead, feigning an arrogance he doesn't possess, but God, he'd like to.  
Dean is so tempted to just do it, just slam home and give it to Sam with everything he's got, but he won't. But Sam's words make his cock twitch where it's buried inside of him, and he whimpers a little.  
  
He regains what little composure he's got left and lets his voice slide, low and dirty. "Depends. Do you want me to move?"  
  
Even if he does risk incurring Sam's wrath, it's so, so worth it. Will be worth it, in the end. Asking Sam to have patience is a little bit too mean, even for him; seven years is long enough to wait. But Dean wants to make this memorable as much as Sam wants to remember it. Dean knows that if they just get it over with as quickly as they can, they'll lose the potential for this to be earth-shattering. So he grips Sam's hip with his fingers, keeps perfectly still inside of him, and is impervious to Sam's attempts to get him to move.  
  
Sam feels Dean's muscles tense, and gets perfectly well how strenuous the effort must be. And he doesn't understand why Dean is making it so difficult, but he knows that he wants to give Dean everything he wants.  
  
"Please," he begs, then, not worrying about dignity, or shame, or the fact that the man with him is fundamentally a stranger. "Please, fuck me hard. Give it to me, Dean, come on, I've wanted it, you, for so long I'm going crazy! Please..." He cranes his neck to look at Dean, and this time he doesn't stop a couple of frustrated tears from running down his cheeks.  
  
Dean loses it. At those words, so pretty and broken, he can't control it any more. He fucks into Sam so hard the whole bed shakes, headboard smacking against the wall; Sam slides up a few inches, catches himself just before his head smacks into the iron where his hands are tied. He slams in and out of Sam's ass with all the strength he possesses, drives the breath out of him in short bursts and changes angle mid-thrust. There's an art to the way Sam's whole body tightens at that, the way Sam bucks up to meet him, and soon he can't even support himself on his elbows.  
  
And god, it's so good. He knows he's making sounds but he can't quite hear them over the rush of blood in his ears, over the pleasure crawling up his spine; he bites every inch of skin he can reach with his mouth, possibly draws blood a few times, but he can't be sure.  
  
All he's sure of is that just then, in the rush and the heat of it, some sort of fucking _miracle_ is taking place. He can't remember ever fucking anyone the way he's fucking Sam, but then again, he can't think about anyone else when he's wrapped around, inside, through Sam, twined tight against him like a rope. Stars burst behind his eyes, and he knows that this is going to add up to be the best orgasm he's ever had. His legs shake with the effort of pushing forward, but the tightening there is an afterthought to the bright, sharp sensation that rips through him.  
  
Once Dean finally lets go it's like a dam has broken.  
  
He pounds into Sam as if there's no tomorrow, and Sam tries to give it back equally as hard, using his limited possibilities.  
  
He twitches, and pushes, and clenches, all the time moaning like a two-dollar whore, but he doesn't care.  
Dean is taking everything Sam has to offer, and he couldn't ask for more.  
  
His knees ache, and he can't feel his hands anymore, and still he wouldn't change it for anything else in the world.  
  
He feels a well known pull at the base of his dick, and shakes violently.  
  
"Dean-" he pleads, his voice hoarse and raw "I'm gonna- touch me, please."  
  
Sam arches his back as far as it goes, feels muscles he didn't even know he had tense, and he wishes he could kiss Dean now.  
  
Sam's plea reaches Dean as if from a distance; it echoes inside of his mind until he finally realizes he's got to stop pressing bruises into Sam's hip. He fumbles, uncoordinated, too busy keeping his hard, steady rhythm going to be good at it.  
  
Dean finally finds what he's looking for, wraps a hand around Sam's cock and pulls; as he pushes Sam's hips downward with his thrusts, Sam's cock slides through his fingers. He squeezes lightly, finds the knot just under the head and presses into it, hard.  
  
He can feel it snaking down his spine, pooling in his belly; his own release isn't far away and he has to make sure Sam comes first. He absolutely has to.  
  
"Come on," he growls, and he can't tell if Sam can hear him or not. "Come for me."  
  
Dean voice tightens around his cock like a vice, more than his hand, and it's the demanding tone that Sam has dreamed about so many times that's his undoing.  
  
He comes instantly, so hard that some of his come reaches his own chin, and then he sobbing in the pillow under his cheek, because it's too much, too good, and now that he has had it he's gonna have to live without it, and he's not sure he'll ever be able to.  
  
His cock twitches and spurts a few more drops on Dean's fingers, before Sam falls boneless on the sheets, panting and completely spent.  
  
He uses what's left of his strength to clench around Dean's dick, urging him with broken, senseless words to mark Sam as his.  
  
Feeling Sam lose it nearly tips Dean over the edge. He's muttering, a low chain of words and sounds that have no meaning. God, he can let go now, he can let himself take what's his to claim.  
  
A few more thrusts and he's coming, ripping apart at the seams with how intense it is. He spurts deep inside of Sam, fills him up with his come until it's leaking out of him, and even then he can't stop. He rides the wave of it, stays at the very crest for as long as he can until his muscles can't give anymore. Already exhausted from exertion, his legs crumple underneath him. Weakly, he tries to pump his hips but has no leverage and finally just gives in to the twitchy aftershocks.  
  
His orgasm doesn't just stop; the edge of his pleasure softens and trails off, and when he finally, blissfully comes back to earth, there are three things he's aware of.  
  
He's crying. There's wet running down his cheeks and his chest seizes like he's been doing it for a while.  
He's sticky, and Sam beneath him is sticky, and he's got to be heavy but Sam isn't complaining.  
  
And he never wants to move. He wants to be here, in this gray space where only he and Sam exist, for as long as he can. Forever is a lofty word, but it pretty much sums up how he feels; he wants to have Sam as much as Sam wants him, as often as he can.  
  
He's not going anywhere.  
  
Sam's breath is taken away by the feeling of Dean coming inside of him.  
  
True, no one’s ever done before, so he doesn't actually have any term of comparison, but he doesn't need to. He knows that with Dean is different, because Dean is different.  
  
Dean is everything Sam has ever wanted, and now that he has had him so close he's even surer of it.  
  
Once finally Dean is spent, he falls on Sam, putting a considerable strain on his already hurting arms, but he won't say a word, because every second he spends skin on skin with Dean is a second to treasure.  
  
"Wow," is all he can say, and he's not even sure he has said it out loud, and then he closes his eyes, breathing in Dean's scent mixed with sex, sweat and Sam.  
  
There is no better smell in the world, Sam decides then and there.  
  
At some point, though, the metal of the cuffs starts to actually tear his skin, and Sam can't help whimpering in pain.  
  
"Dean..." he mutters, shaking his wrists and making the cuffs tingle.  
  
Dean sighs, contented, and kisses Sam's aching shoulder before he rolls off. His legs don't want to work on the way back to his pants, even less when he has to crouch to retrieve them, but he keeps his winces of pain to himself. Sam's got to be hurting far more. He finds the kit in his back pocket and opens it with shaking hands, taking out the equipment he needs, and returns to the bed. He sits on the bed near Sam's outstretched arms and leans in close to the cuffs, feeling around for the keyhole.  
  
There's a small knob on the side of one of them. Dean frowns and presses it, and the cuffs spring open.  
"Uh," he says as he gently takes Sam's wrists out of the metal.  
  
Sam's eyes go wide when he hears the soft click and feels the muscles in his arms finally relax. He looks up at where the cuffs hang, open, and blinks.  
  
"What the hell?" he exclaims, surprised and feeling more than a little stupid. He’s been suffering for hours when all it had taken was for him to read the instructions on the box. "You must think I'm a complete spaz," he says, not even looking at Dean's face.  
  
Everything he’s done to impress him has only made things worse.  
  
Dean snorts. "I don't," before he starts to laugh. Really laugh, for the first time since he can remember. The whole bed shakes with it and he can't control it; the sound booms around the walls, and he only notices when he trails off that Sam has joined him.  
  
When the moment passes, and they settle down again, Sam softly brushes Dean's arm.  
  
"I've missed your laugh," he admits, with a shy little smile. Any awkwardness that could have been laying on them until then has vanished, and what's left is… the warmth.  
  
Sam would like to hide his feelings; he doesn't want to feel more vulnerable than he already does, but if not with Dean then with who?  
  
So he simply lets his walls fall, and stares at Dean with all the love, admiration and earnestness of his 25 years. Dean looks down at Sam. He hasn't moved, but something about him is changed.  
  
It's almost like he expects Dean to leave.  
  
"Dude," he says, scoots down the bed and kisses Sam. "I'm not going anywhere." He whispers, close, so close he can feel Sam breathing. "Do you know how long it's been since I laughed, man? Too long. I want you to be happy, and you make me happy, so. Unless I'm missing some vital part of the equation..."  
  
Sam's voice gets stuck in his throat, as he finally gets to touch Dean's face with trembling fingers.  
  
"I used to think that I just needed to get you out of my system." His voice is soft and laced with emotion. "And that once I had, I was finally going to be able to move on, find a nice, easy job and settle down." He shakes his head, snorting.  
  
"Now, I'm having second thoughts."  
  
He looks back at Dean and squeezes his wrist. “I don't want a nice job. And I don't want regular. I want this. You. For as long as I'll be allowed to have you."  
  
Once he's done talking, he beams at Dean and then he snuggles closer, laying his head on Dean's shoulder and sighing happily.  
  
Dean rests his cheek on top of Sam's head. "Really?"  
  
"Yeah, I think," Sam answers, grinning sleepily at Dean as he tightens his possessive hold on his chest.  
"This cop I met when I was 18 would have wanted me to stick with what feels right."  
  
He's already drifting off, when Dean's voice snaps him out of it.  
  
"Sam?" Dean waits until Sam makes a sleep sound that says he's listening. "Have you ever considered joining the police force?"

 

  
_"He's going to become a cop, you know that, right?" Uriel is quite sure Castiel didn't mean to sound this mocking - that would be so out of character, for him - but it stings anyway.  
"You did something," Uriel accuses. "You created that whole backstory to change his motives, didn't you?"  
Castiel stares at him. "I didn't tamper with it. Perhaps Sam's intentions will remain true no matter what we change about their lives," he suggests, even if he can feel Uriel's wrath as a tangible thing.  
  
Uriel is shaking and if he was a little less focused on the objective of this bet, he'd probably just shoot it all to Hell; matter of fact, he knows what is at stake and he's ready to work it out.  
  
"Whatever," he mutters, as he snaps his fingers and the room around them fades to black.  
Castiel might have won the first battle, but the war is still long, and Uriel has more than an ace up his sleeve._

 

  
**TBC...**


	3. ~ II. 5% Pleasure ~

  


  
Murphy's is the best-known dive in this part of the city. It lingers on the outskirts and harbors all sorts of men on the wrong side of the law most nights. It's not the safest place to work, but the wage is fair and the hours are flexible. And it isn't hard, besides.  
  
Dean just wishes he didn't have to lock up. It's close to midnight and the bikers are slowly filtering out with their girls, taking with them the loud, raucous laughter. Thirty minutes to closing and the clock behind the bar ticks so slowly that Dean isn't sure it's moving at all.  
  
The haze of cigarette smoke that still lingers in the air and the tall guy at the end of the bar are nearly all that's left. It's strangely silent with most of the patrons gone; Dean hums to fill the silence, some out-of-tune version of a Metallica riff as he takes the used glasses off the bar and gathers them to clean.  
  
He wipes the watermarks off the gleaming wood finish, tosses the used napkins into the trash can near his feet (and seriously, would it kill them to clean up after themselves? He's a bartender, not a maid), and is about to go out into the lobby with a fresh rag when the stranger calls for another.  
  
He's been here since Dean started his shift this afternoon, nursing drink after drink and not speaking outside of calling for more. Dean's been too busy dealing with the other customers to cut him off properly, but it's late and if this guy needs help getting wherever he's going (looks like, from the way he's swaying in his seat), he's obligated to help.  
  
Pay for a taxi, at least, if there's no one that'll come get him.  
  
And Dean would really, really like to get home sometime before two in the morning.  
  
"Closing time, buddy," he says, sweeps the glass out of the guy's fingers before he can slur out a protest and places it with the others. "Someone I can call for you?"  
  
There are a lot of things he expects; he's been doing this for a while. He's taken care of all manner of drunks; sloppy ones that vomited on him, sad ones that would sob and beg for just one more even as they were being helped into a taxi, pigheaded ones that were convinced they weren't drunk, fell over on their way to the door, and had to have their car keys stolen before they did any serious damage.  
  
But this guy doesn't respond. He just looks up at Dean from under his fringy bangs with sad eyes that aren't begging, not exactly. His empty fingers curl in on themselves and he just... stares, doesn't move.  
  
"Dude?" Dean asks, waves a hand in front of the guy's face, and gets nothing. He steps around the bar and clasps the guy's shoulder, tugs the stool around.  
  
His eyes still register movement, so the guy's not completely gone yet. He just watches for a few minutes and then says, in a tiny, hoarse voice. "I don't wanna go home."  
  
He's surprisingly eloquent for a guy that's been drinking for hours. Maybe he's not as drunk as Dean originally thought, but that still doesn't fix their problem.  
  
"You don't have to, but you can't stay here. Need me to call a cab or something? On the house."  
  
"No," the guy whines, petulant, and Dean resists the urge to roll his eyes. "I don't wanna. Can't."  
  
"Look--" Dean's reserves of patience aren't exactly endless. It'd be better if he weren't so damn tired, but it's been a long day and there's a shower at home with his name on it. He wants to scrub the bar-smell off his skin so he won't wake up in the morning half-hung-over from breathing the fumes all night.  
  
He doesn't want to deal with whiny drunks, which are worse than sloppy drunks and pigheaded ones combined.  
  
"Nnrph," the guy interrupts, and Dean suddenly has an armful of what feels like a clutching, squirmy octopus. He staggers under the sudden weight, has to focus on not falling over with all of the drunk stranger suddenly bearing down on him. The guy's huge hands are all over him, rucking up under his shirt and clutching at the back of his neck for balance.  
  
"Pretty," he breathes into Dean's neck. "Want."  
  
"Uh, no." Dean bats his hands away and disentangles himself. "Not that kind of bar." He pushes the stranger back onto his stool and starts toward the phone, tries to slow his breathing down to something manageable. Yeah, the guy's drunk and won't notice, but it's the principle of the thing. "Just sit tight. I'll take care of you."  
  
There's something pulsing in his gut, something that's been locked away and buried for too long. Suddenly, he _wants_ , and he definitely wasn't interested fifteen minutes ago. Nor does he make wanting the customers a habit; he doesn't even touch the hot chicks that come wandering in unclaimed. It takes a special sort of willpower to deny them when they look at him that way, but he does.  
  
Doesn't hurt that most of the time he's subjected to bikers' crude humor, either. But now, with his sad eyes and nothing more than a push in the right direction, this guy has completely undone all his hard work at being noble.  
  
He hears him sigh from somewhere behind, and he has a hand on the receiver where it hangs on the wall. He doesn't want to call someone, doesn't want to get a look the guy's pretty little wife or a college buddy or deal with an anonymous taxi driver that wants to get home just a little bit worse than Dean does himself.  
  
But he's stronger than this and entirely sober, so he listens to the dial tone and starts to dial the dispatch number.  
  
He doesn't get all the way through it before there's a strangled, bitten-off moan from the stranger. Dean turns, clutching the phone so hard his knuckles turn white; he's still propped against the counter, but now his head is thrown back. One arm clutches the edge of the bar so he doesn't fall and the other has disappeared underneath. From his vantage point, he can't see what's going on, but he can pretty much guess.  
  
It shouldn't get to him like it does. He's completely sold on the idea right then and there, the suggestion the guy's plainly laying out in front of him; it'd take a saint to resist the column of his neck as it's arched back, the sloppy look of ecstasy on his face that has the corners of his mouth curving up.  
  
The guy's kind of beautiful strung out like that, and Dean hasn't fucked a guy in longer than he'd care to admit.  
  
"Please," he whimpers, and Dean hangs the phone back on the hook before he drops it.  
  
Mechanically, he goes to lock the doors and turn off the neon 'open' sign.

 

  
This is the story of Sam's life: he's addicted to bad decisions.  
  
It's not like he consciously picks the wrong choice, but the bottom line is that he does. Every. Single. Time.  
  
It started with this big fight with his dad; Sam might have been an army brat, but he wasn't going to be an army teen, let alone an army adult. So he simply packed his bags and left to go to college instead of the military school his dad had picked out for him.  
  
First mistake.  
  
Stanford was great, hands down, but still-Sam wasn't happy, and changed his major three times during the first couple of years, before he figured out that it simply wasn't right and dropped out altogether.  
  
Then he met her, and as soon as they shook their hands he had felt the connection; it hadn't been long before they moved in together and started living like a married couple, shifting soon into an intimate routine.  
  
Second mistake.  
  
Sam wasn't a big fan of habits and routine, something he used to hate back when he was living with his dad, so his skin itched every time he felt forced to do something. Sharing his life with Jessica and altering his ways to accommodate hers was an imposition, no matter how many times Sam tried to convince himself that it was just a form of compromise.  
  
Jessica was an amazing girl, probably the most amazing he'd ever have the luck of meeting or dating, and what was between them was love, pure, utter, unadulterated love, the kind of love pop songs are about, and yet it wasn't enough.  
  
Sam didn't need much time to realize it, but he stubbornly refused to acknowledge it; first of all because he didn't want to hurt Jessica, who didn't do anything to deserve it, and secondly because he was insanely pigheaded and couldn't tolerate the fact that he had done the wrong thing again.  
  
So he had just clenched his jaw and moved on, hoping that the dreadful feeling in the pit of his stomach was going to disappear on his own at some point.  
  
Third, fatal mistake.  
  
It didn't, and Jessica was too smart not to notice that something was up.  
  
She was also a kind, understanding person, so at first she didn't say a word, giving Sam plenty of space to be the one to approach the subject; when she finally got that Sam wasn't going to talk about it ever, if he could help it, she started to get antsy, and snappy, and in the end she simply exploded.  
  
Sam had gone out, again, and didn't answer her calls, again, so when he finally got home and she discovered he had forgotten today was their anniversary, she couldn't take it anymore. They'd screamed at each other, and accusations had flown in their small living room.  
  
What it had come to, in the end, was that Jessica knew that Sam wasn't in love with her.  
  
"But I do love you," he had objected, and she had simply shaken her head, pointing out that "there are no buts in love, not when there is any love to work with". Sam had only been able to lower his head at those words.  
  
All in all, Jessica had been sweet and kind (she is majoring in psychology, after all) and told him that she wouldn't be able to keep standing by him when she knew that Sam saw someone else every time he looked at her.  
  
"I know you haven't cheated on me, I know you never would," she had explained, "but I also know that I can't make you happy, and that kills me inside some more every day, because I see the bouncy, happy guy I fell for fading away little by little."  
  
She had sat next to him and had taken his hands in hers.  
  
"I don't want to do this anymore, Sam," she had concluded. "I won't keep lying to you and especially to myself. It's going to be hard, but it's over, and we have to deal with it."  
  
Sam knew that he should have protested. He knew that when she disappeared upstairs to pack and came back down after a couple of hours with her suitcase ready and told him that the movers were going to come by the day after to get the rest, he should have stopped her, convinced her to stay, to try again.  
  
He could see in her eyes that she hoped he would.  
  
But Jessica had been strong enough to lay out in the open everything he had been trying so hard to hide, and he owed it to her courage to stop pretending. Besides, she was too amazing for him to keep hurting her, and she deserved a chance to find someone who loved her wholeheartedly and worshipped the ground she walked on.  
  
She deserved a second chance at happiness, and if Sam wasn't the guy who could make her happen, at least he could let her be happy somewhere else. Which was why he went to the first off-campus bar he could find and started drinking at six in the evening.  
  
He had lost the right to worry about her, but that didn't mean that he was going to stop caring.  
  
Every time the alcohol stopped burning down his throat, behind his eyelids he could see his empty, silent house, and a wave of panic washed over him, so he just kept on drinking until he couldn't even remember his own address.  
  
Only thing his mind could focus on by then was a couple of eyes, the greenest eyes he had ever seen, so pretty that he couldn't help but wanting to get closer in order to be able to count each and every stripe of gold in the pupils.  
  
Sam wasn't sure who the eyes belonged to, and he wasn't sure he actually cared.  
  
He just knew that they were there for him to admire and he also knew, somehow, that those eyes were going to be the first (maybe the only) right thing in his life.  
  
Ever.

 

  
Dean just stands back and watches for a minute, takes in the way the guy’s slouched. The bar must be digging painfully into his back, and all of that tall frame shoved into the tiny space he’s afforded himself can’t be comfortable. But it’s not like the guy is sober enough to mind and Dean rarely allows himself this.  
  
A thin sheen of sweat has broken out along the stranger’s skin as he fumbles at himself. He can’t quite get there, can’t get enough friction and is uncoordinated as hell trying to do it. It should be pathetic but it isn’t, isn’t quite enough to stop the steady need pushing through him. He groans, leans forward with his eyes closed, and a small line of concentration appears between his eyebrows.  
  
And Dean can’t stand it anymore. He steps forward, closes his fingers around the guy’s wrist and pulls his hand away.  
  
"I'm horny," Sam whines, weakly pulling in order to free his hand and keep trying to get some sort of relief.  
He doesn't succeed in breaking the bartender's hold, though, so after a handful of seconds he gives up, groans and encircles the bartender's leg with his own, pulling him closer and grinding against his thigh.  
  
"Fuck yeah," he murmurs, laying his head back again as his movements get frantic, but it's still not enough.  
He doesn't have control of his body, can't manage the right amount of pressure or a steady rhythm, and his eyes fill with tears of frustration as he tries to straighten his back a little.  
  
"Help," he pants straight into the bartender's ear.  
  
Dean plants a hand against the bar and tries not to let the stranger’s sharp movements unseat him. He leans in, nips at the guy’s earlobe as best he can with the way he’s moving and whispers, “You’re drunk,” as if he can reconcile this.  
  
But it’s not like he wants to. The guy’s thick cock grinding against his thigh, even through layers of denim, feels better than anything has in a long time and, if anything, he’s helping him out. He can pretend it’s not a selfish thing, even if it’s not true.  
  
"Yeah, I am drunk. So?"  
  
Sam would laugh at the stupid, obvious statement, if his brain wasn't focused so sharply on the need to come, now.  
  
Dean feels around with the hand that isn’t holding him up, finds the hem of the guy’s shirt and pushes it up enough to get at his belt. “Shh,” he hisses, trying to get a hold through the other’s frantic bucking. And because he can’t not talk, because he has to at least make it seem like it’s a normal thing, he flicks his tongue, licking the shell of the guy’s ear, and whispers, “I gotcha. You got a name?”  
  
Dean isn’t even sure this guy is sober enough to remember it, but that’s so not the point right now. He has to have a name to refer to him by, like that small thing will rectify the fact that what he’s doing is so very wrong. When he finally gets the guy’s belt undone, pushes his hand inside the waistband of his jeans and finally gets it wrapped around his cock, he can’t bring himself to care.

 

  
The bartender's words soothe him, and penetrate through his haze and confusion, making him feel safe and protected, which is so out of place that Sam can't even start to process the sensation and just rolls with it.  
One of the perks of being completely wasted.  
  
Then the guy asks him something, an important question, and Sam is thrown off for a second, furrowing his burrow, trying to recollect enough brain cells to answer, because, damn, wouldn't it be even hotter if together with the bartender's lips, tongue and fingers he could also get the bartender's hoarse voice to call him by his name?  
  
Name, name.  
  
"Sam," he masters in the end. "Sam. I am. Sam."  
  
He can't concentrate, so he's not sure the name is the right one, hell, he's not even sure he managed to say it out loud.  
  
He just wants, needs-  
  
Sam cries out in pleasure as the bartender's hand finally, finally reaches its destination and starts jerking him off.  
  
“Sam,” Dean purrs. Sam’s breath smells like alcohol, and he wants to kiss him but he won’t. That would make it something else, something it’s not, and he couldn’t stand it. He strokes Sam fast, flicks his thumb up underneath and crown and does as best as he can with the limited space.  
  
His own need is incessant, prickles underneath his skin, but he can wait. God, he can wait if he just gets to have this; Sam’s cock fits perfectly in his hand like it was made for this, silky smooth and leaking. From the way he jerks, from the way his dick twitches in Dean’s hand, he can tell it isn’t going to take long.  
  
But he wants it to. He wants Sam to be this strung-out forever, be this dependent on him and needing him this much – but the goal here is not his own pleasure. He needs to get Sam off as quickly as possible.  
He redoubles his efforts until his arm aches with it.  
  
Sam has lost any rest of dignity and is now moaning like a two dollar whore under the bartender's expert ministrations.  
  
_Wait_ , Sam thinks. _Maybe he_ is _a whore._  
  
After all, how could this guy not be one? He's disgustingly pretty, and the way he moves his wrist... professional, no doubt about it.  
  
Once Sam has reached this conclusion, suddenly any guilt or awkwardness disappears and he lets himself go. Who better than someone who does it for a living can help him forget?  
  
Right now, in the bartender's arms, he realizes sex has never been quite like this for him.  
  
Sex has always been a matter of duty, something he thought he was supposed to do, listening to the few friends he and Jessica had, and he never thought he could enjoy it this way.  
  
He has a flash of the bartender breaching his body with his long fingers and then pushing inside of him, his muscles taut with the effort of waiting for Sam's body to get used to the intrusion before he starts pounding.  
The image alone is almost enough to make him come then and there, but he still needs something else, something else.  
  
He can taste the orgasm on the top of his tongue, it's so close he can see it, but still so far that he can't reach it. "Please," he begs. "Please. I'm-I can't-" he bites his lower lip, hard, and then soothes the sting, licking it again and again, his fingers twitching as they grab the bartender's biceps desperately.  
  
Dean gives up. He can feel the tension radiating through Sam’s body, the raw live wire of the alcohol-fueled need that’s taken over. The way he rubs against him, clutches to get closer…  
  
When he kisses Sam, he can’t stand the stale taste of what he’s been drinking all day. He almost pulls back, but something stops him – the desperate way Sam just _opens_ for him, presses tighter and sighs with his entire body. He moves down, mouthing over his neck, his jaw, sucks Sam’s bottom lip into his mouth and runs his tongue over it again and again.  
  
Sam’s words have disintegrated into jumbled sounds, syllables that tumble out of his mouth and into Dean’s. Uncoordinated, sloppy, he moves forward to claim Dean’s mouth for his own; he’s used to being in control.  
  
Dean won’t stand for it. He needs to claim, not be claimed. Sam’s tongue recedes from its initial explorations and Dean surges forward with his own, pushing past Sam’s teeth once, twice, fucks in and out as fast as he can. His jaw aches, but Sam makes the most delicious little noises and he eats them up, takes them in stride and pulls at his dick like his life, in this moment, depends solely on getting Sam off.  
  
“C’mon,” he growls between thrusts of his tongue, “C’mon Sammy.”  
  
It's not the kiss, even though it must be the hottest kiss in Sam's life, and it's not the euphoria of being able to give some of the control up to the bartender.  
  
No, it's Dean's voice, hoarse and raw, using a pet name no one has used since when he was five that throws him over the edge.  
  
He squeezes his eyes shut and hides his face against Dean's shoulder, sobbing in relief as his orgasm is ripped out of him, and it hurts, because it's too much, too soon, but Sam wouldn't have it any other way.  
  
The pain is excruciating as it subsides, and it's laced with pleasure so tightly that Sam can't tell when one ends and the other begins. He lifts his heavy lidded eyes and as he stares at the bartender's plush lips, glistening with their mixed saliva, his cock twitches valiantly.  
  
That's when he realizes that he has somehow sobered up and can now think with so much more clarity.  
First thought to cross his mind is that the bartender knows Sam's name, but Sam doesn't have a clue about who the guy is.  
  
"So," he starts, "what's your name? And spare me the 'which one would you like?' crap."  
  
Dean blinks. He doesn’t know how someone can still be so drunk after an orgasm like the one Sam just had, but he did drink a lot earlier. Watching him come apart almost sent him over the edge; might of, if there’d been more than the pressure of denim on his own dick. As it is, he’s still painfully hard and he doesn’t really care.  
  
“Dean,” he breathes, drops his own head back because it’s painful to maintain the angle it takes to kiss Sam. “I’m Dean.” He can’t expect Sam to reciprocate, but damn his arm hurts.  
  
Dean probably doesn't expect Sam to do anything to relieve his current situation, and judging by the arch of his eyebrow he doesn't realize that Sam is back in control and knows what he has to do.  
  
In theory.  
  
"I've never done this. To someone else," Sam states, his gaze shifting to the side, as he swiftly unbuttons and unzips Dean's pants.  
  
The bartender gapes at him, and maybe Sam isn't supposed to touch, but what the hell. The guy's so hard he could pound nails with his dick, and Sam's nothing but a gentleman. He starts to jerk Dean off using every dirty trick in his book he knows get him off when he wants something quick and messy, hoping they will work on Dean too.  
  
"Don't you wanna come, Dean?" he whispers, his mouth brushing the point where Dean's pulse pounds. "Show me how you like it. Want to make it good. For you." Sam knows he's babbling, but he doesn't know what else to do, and he instinctively knows that this man letting go must be the most gorgeous sight on earth.  
  
His movements speed up, as he plays with Dean's balls, scraping the tender skin slightly with his nails, and bites his bobbing Adam’s apple.  
  
There's maybe half a second where Dean isn't so sure he should take advantage of a drunk guy like this, but Sam's huge _paw_ is around him and fuck, he couldn't stop now if he wanted to. He tries to grasp on to some edge of reason, but it slips away and he doesn't really care, not right now. He pushes his hips forward into Sam's grip, sloppy and uncoordinated and he hasn't even been drinking.  
  
His orgasm sweeps up on him quickly, makes every muscle tighten and seize; he comes all over both of them, adding to the mess that Sam’s already created between them. It’s lightening-bright, sharp, and when he can breathe again he only just stops himself from slumping forward.  
  
But the angle’s right, and Sam’s right _there_ , and suddenly all Dean can think about (beside the fact that he just came harder than he has in a long time) is what it felt like to kiss Sam, and how awesome it’d be to do it again.  
  
So he does. He leans in, breath coming hard against Sam's skin, and his kiss lands at the corner of Sam's mouth.  
  
Once Dean steps back, Sam stares at him with his eyes at half-mast, looking dazed and hazy.  
  
Then he remembers something, blinking, and licks his lips, searching for Dean's taste on them.  
  
"Didn't you have some sort of _no kissing_ rule? Like, kissing is the only thing I can keep for myself, and all that shit?" he asks, his voice shaking, while he still tries to come down from the high of one of the best orgasms he has ever had.  
  
His fingers swirl through Dean's come on his naked belly distractedly, trying to make sense of everything that's happening to him and willing his cock to _get down_ , dammit.  
  
"Uh," Dean raises an eyebrow, tries to focus on getting his feet back under him. He can't remember where he left his bar towel, even if it would be really useful right now. Instead of trying to find it, he just stands there, blinking at Sam. It's an awkward few minutes, because he has no idea what's going on and still can't get his brain cells to align right. He clears his throat and looks down.  
  
When it becomes clear that their moment has passed and Dean is just waiting for him to man up and leave, Sam pulls his shirt down and chuckles nervously.  
  
"Okay, uh. Thanks, I guess."  
  
He scratches the back of his head, uncomfortably, then he attempts to look at Dean from under his long bangs. "So... how much do I owe you?" he inquires.  
  
He hopes it won't be too much, because he doesn't know how much cash he has in his wallet, and he somehow doubts that Dean will let Sam pay his services with a credit card.  
  
"Owe...?" And then Dean gets it, and it's not about the tab Sam's been adding up since he got there. "Wait. You... you think I'm...?" He doesn't know whether to be insulted or not. He tries to think back on everything's that's happened, on what he may have done to make Sam think that, but apparently it isn't a new development; almost everything Sam's said tonight has implied that he...  
  
Dean glares. "I am _not_ a hooker."  
  
He spots the towel farther down the bar and stalks off, tucks himself back in and fixes his pants before he starts to clean himself up. Sam is silent. He stands this for a few more minutes before he turns, quickly. "What would make you think I was a hooker?!"  
  
Sam feels his cheeks burn, and really doesn't know what to say. _You're too good at sex not to be_ or _you have the most perfect cocksucking lips I've ever seen_ don't seem to be the right answer to give, so Sam simply thinks them but doesn't share them with Dean.  
  
In the end he settles for something closer to the truth. "That was the best sex of my life."  
  
Then he just hangs his head in shame and fidgets, unable to look at Dean, too busy trying to fit his whole foot in his mouth to realize he's said it out loud.

 

  
_At Sam's words, the reel of film screeches to a halt.  
  
Uriel turns to Castiel, triumphant, gloating grin firmly intact. "I told you," he says, showing teeth like a shark's, "Lust. That's all they have - filthy lust. Sinning." His voice is full of contempt, and he looks like he's about to continue, but Castiel shoots him a deadly dark glance and the words die in his throat.  
  
Castiel knew that Uriel has stayed silent during the frantic moment of pleasure the brothers shared only because he was waiting for the first sign of lust, to prove him wrong.  
  
Well, he won't be able to.  
  
“Just watch,” Castiel says, sternly, and turns back to the Winchesters as the film starts to roll again._

 

  
For the first time, Dean honestly doesn't know what to say. And yeah, he works at a dive, so he's used to comments about his lips and how pretty he is, it's not like bunches of other people haven't made the same mistake; they just usually don't say it right after they've jerked him off.  
  
And it's kind of flattering, because he's never been told like this before - and Sam's so embarrassed about it... but then again, Sam's still not entirely sober and the same rules just don't apply. Dean doesn't want him to feel bad, anyway. He frowns. "Dude," he says, because what else can he say? He moves back toward Sam, sits in the stool next to him, and offers him the towel.  
  
Sam takes it, muttering a low _thank you_ as he desperately tries not to focus on the fact that the spunk he's drying off is _Dean's_ or his cock will be ready for round two before he has the time to leave the bar.  
  
Once he's more or less clean, Sam stands up on wobbly legs, staring at the towel in his hands for a moment and then leaving it on the counter. Not sure what to do with his hands, he pushes them down into his pockets as far as they go, his gaze shifting restlessly everywhere but on Dean.  
  
He has to apologize, he knows he has, but he can't. He only said what he felt, and there can't be anything wrong with that.  
  
Dean leans back against the bar, rolling his shoulders against the press of it on his back, and tries to look lax even if his arms are shaking. Still weak from Sam's hands on him. It's absolutely crazy, but as he looks up and see Sam's uncertainty, something clicks.  
  
"Hey," he says, gently, waits until Sam raises his eyes. "We, uh. I think we got something going here. I mean, besides the fact that you thought I was a hooker and all.” He scratches at the back of his neck. “If you wanna… I’m off Tuesdays and Thursdays.” Dean ends with a sort of half-dismissive wave of his hand, and returns it to his lap automatically. Why the hell is he nervous?  
  
Sam blinks, and for an instant he's afraid that he's imagining all of this, the spark in Dean's eyes, the hope shining through his crooked smile.  
  
"Uh, but-I am..." he bites his lower lip, stopping himself before he does something stupid, like run away from Dean, because he can have doubts about a lot of things, but he's absolutely positive he's not imagining is the electricity crackling between them.  
  
That's something you can't fake.  
  
So he just beams at Dean, a smile so wide his dimples cut deep holes in his cheeks, and offers his hand to Dean. "Hi, my name is Sam and I'm a failed student. Can I invite you to breakfast? I think I owe you."  
  
Dean grins wide, deliriously happy for no reason he can name. Except that Sam's smile is absolutely beautiful when he means it, and that he really, really wants to take him up on that offer. He grips Sam's hand and squeezes. "Dean, bartender. And I think I'd like that."  
  
Murphy's fades to black in the background, taking Sam, Dean, and their smiling faces with it.

 

  
_Castiel and Uriel appear in the middle of the bar, suddenly empty. Castiel crosses his arms on his chest and smirks at Uriel.  
  
"...you were saying?"  
  
Uriel clenches his jaw, growling curses at his superior._

 

 

**TBC...**


	4. ~ III. 10% Luck ~

  


  
When Dean walks through the door right after work, the first thing he does (after throwing the keys on the kitchen counter, shucking his coat and grabbing a beer) is boot up the computer in his home office.  
  
It's an older model, but it runs fine (most of the time; getting the internet to work right was a process at first), and he'd recently purchased a brand-new flat screen monitor for it. The start-up messages flicker across the screen and he settles back into his nice, luxury desk chair, takes a long pull at his beer and toys with the slinky on his desk until the computer gets warmed up.  
  
It takes a bit of time, but the first program to boot on start-up is MSN Messenger. It automatically signs him in and he waits until it's done calibrating whatever it's calibrating (MSN is always tedious to work, but he puts up with it) so he can see who's online.  
  
If _Salt83_ is online.  
  
They've been talking for about a year now, and it'd be a little creepier if it hadn't been so long. However, now that the trial period had passed, it was verging on hopeless. The first thing he did when he woke up in the morning (right after his shower, and that usually meant he was wearing nothing but a towel, which should have been more awkward than it was) was log into Messenger to see if Salt was online. Sometimes he was, sometimes he wasn't; guy kept weird hours wherever he worked. But regardless, Dean would drop a note to him to be retrieved when he signed in.  
  
The first thing he did when he got home from work (now, for example), was boot up the computer and see if Salt was online. He rarely wasn't.  
  
Dean had met Salt on chance on a forum somewhere; until about a year ago, Dean hadn't spent much time near a computer at all. Somehow, in the last year he'd grown to be some sort of nerd or something. And it was all Salt's fault, of course.  
The speakers chimed, and a box popped up from the taskbar, announcing that Salt had logged on. Grinning, Dean clicked the banner and started typing.

 

  
As soon as the _ding_ echoes in the bar, Sam lets the mop fall and bounces to the computer in the corner, a beaming grin already lightening up his face. Ellen shakes her head, amused, as Jo sighs. "And that's the last we'll see of Sam tonight, ladies and gentlemen," she states, starting to recollect glasses and empty plates.  
  
It's quite early still, but the Roadhouse is almost empty: there are only a couple of college students sitting close to the counter, and one of them, a pretty blonde girl, has been staring at Sam since she stepped in. As to confirm her fears, the girl blinks, in confusion, and turns her big blue eyes on Jo. "Why? What's going on?" she asks. Jo takes pity on her and decides to tell her before she gets the wrong idea.  
  
"When Dman79 is online, the rest of the world disappears, for Sam," she explains, and the girl looks even more confused.  
  
"Who is Dman?"  
  
"Sam's boyfriend!" exclaims Ash from the pool table where he's cleaning up the girl's friends.  
  
"He's NOT!" Sam retorts, but he's blushing, and the expression on the girl's face turns from hopeful to resigned.  
  
"Sorry, Jessica," Jo murmurs, and Jessica nods. "It's okay."  
  
Sam looks at her and wants to say something, but then Dman is writing and all of Sam's attention is focused on the screen once again. He doesn't even notice when she leaves.  
  
They are just friends, Dman and him, and they didn't exchange any relevant information about what they look like, how old they were or where they lived, even if, with a nickname like that, Sam was inclined to think Dman was a guy.  
  
It freaked him out at first, how comfortable and familiar talking to Dman felt, like they've known each other for forever, like there was some sort of bond between them. Then time passed by, and it became... intimate, safe. Needed.  
  
And Sam lived waiting for the other shoe to drop.

 

  
Despite his earlier anticipation, Dean is apprehensive now. The question he so desperately wants to ask is making the tips of his fingertips tingle with the need to type it out. He has no real idea what Salt's reaction will be - hell, he isn't even sure Salt is a guy. He's going mostly on how he speaks, and that doesn't say anything, really.  
  
They've never seen each other's faces or heard each other's voices, and this anonymous, intimate thing is just that: intimate without having to be personal, even if it already is as personal as they can make it without actually knowing each other. It's a line they don't cross.  
  
And he's about to cross it.  
  
He takes a deep breath, cracks his knuckles and types out, 'Hey, I have an idea.' He waits two entire seconds before continuing. 'I think we should meet up sometime. It'd be fun. What'd you think?'  
  
Dean hits the 'enter' button and waits.

 

  
Sam lets out an embarrassingly loud squeak, and both Jo and Ellen run up to him, worried.  
  
"What's wrong?" Ellen asks, not really reassured by how pale Sam's face is and by the way his hands are shaking, clenched tightly in his lap.  
  
"Dman, he-he wants to meet," Sam murmurs, turning wide, scared eyes on them.  
  
Jo almost feels like laughing, because _this_ is the problem, but then she thinks about it a little further and gets it, sort of.  
  
"It's about time," Ash says, waving his hand dismissively. "You guys have been dancing around each other for a year, man. It's only natural."  
  
Sam swallows, hard. "I-I guess, but...I can't! I mean, what if...and then..." He's babbling and can't seem to stop, so Ash forces a beer at him. Sam gulps down half of it before he starts to calm down.  
  
He turns to look at his friends, unsure, but he only sees support and understanding. 'I don't know' he types. 'what if we spoil what we have?'

 

  
All of the air leaves Dean's lungs, and he has to breathe a moment, gulp down half of his beer before he can reply. It's mostly bravado; he already feels like this selfish need for something a little less anonymous has ruined the only good thing that's happened to him in a long time. 'What if we don't? We've known each other this long, I'm sure we'll get along just fine, if that's what you're worried about.'

 

  
Sam snorts bitterly, before typing his answer. 'That's not what I'm worried about.'  
  
Before he can hit _send_ , though, he thinks better and deletes the sentence. That would be getting too close to the truth and he can't risk freaking Dman out. After all, Sam thinks he's a guy, but he can't be sure. Besides, even if he is, who says he likes Sam the way Sam likes him?  
  
Maybe he really wants a friend and that's all there is to it.  
  
"Stop worrying, dude. Your little homo crush is most definitely reciprocated." Ash states, encouragingly, gaining a death-glare from both Ellen and Jo before punching Sam's shoulder.  
  
_Fuck it_ , Sam thinks, typing his answer and sending it before he has the time to change his mind. He does want to see Dman. He really does.

 

  
When the sound comes out of the speakers, tinny and small, Dean's looking away. He's pretending to be interested in something on the wall to his left, which is stupid because even if he was watching the screen with bated breath, there's no one here to witness it. He clears his throat, looks over at the Messenger screen, and stares. And stares. And makes the same sort of sound he'd make if he was watching a ball game and his team just scored.  
  
This is good. This is amazing, and he can't even feel nervous about it.  
  
'Awesome,' he types out, and then adds a little smiley face - which he rarely does, but hell, it's a special occasion. 'I'd suggest a place, but I don't even know where you live.'

 

  
Sam lets a small, shy smile appear on his face. Dman sounds genuinely happy and that's all that really matters to him.  
  
'Nebraska' he types, but then Ellen pushes him on the side and adds, 'Maybe we can meet half way?'  
  
"This way we know he's legal," she says, and Ash snickers. Jo rolls her eyes, but still feels sort of proud of this weird family of hers. They don't share the same blood, but that's not what family is about, is it?  
  
"I'm coming with you," she states, determined, even before Dman has had the time to answer. "Wherever it is, however it goes, I'm coming with you."  
  
Sam's grateful gaze warms her up inside, as Ash whoops out loud flailing his arms in the air. "Road trip!"

 

  
'Where in Nebraska?' Dean asks, aware that he's prying but too elated by the hopeful feeling working its way through him to care. 'I'm in Colorado Springs. Not that far no matter how you slice it. You pick the place and I'll be there.'  
  
He knows he really shouldn't, but he feel self-satisfied as he hits the enter button, downs the rest of his beer and goes back into the kitchen to throw the bottle away. He's sure he can get time off work to go wherever he needs to; he hasn't outright talked to Missouri about Salt, but he's sure she'll understand. Might not know anything about cars (despite owning a garage, but he's never really felt the need to ask how that happened), but maybe she'll understand this.  
  
Dean stands in the kitchen for a minute, considers his fridge and then gives in and calls for takeout again. Necessities taken care of, he bolts back into the room he's delegated as his office and checks for Sam's reply.

 

  
"I need a place... a nice place. But not too nice!" Sam stands and starts pacing.  
  
"You also need a place with people," Ellen points out. "I really don't want you to meet a stranger in a secluded area, Sam."  
  
"I've got it!" Ash exclaims. "What about Whiskey Creek Wood Fire Grill in North Platte? You love your steak, and if this guy's good for you he'll love it just the same."  
  
"And it's very romantic," Jo adds, winking, "but not sappy."  
  
Sam nods. "Sure." He doesn't really care about where they will be, he only cares about finally meeting him.  
  
"How should we recognize each other?" Sam wonders, after he has typed the name of the steakhouse and sent it to Dman.  
  
"Oh, I know! A flower!" Jo chirps, as Ash makes gagging sounds.

 

  
"Classy," Dean mutters to himself as he reads Sam's reply, and sends, 'Alright. I think I can make it to North Platte by dinner if I start tomorrow morning. Dinner sound good?' It belatedly occurs to him that he should ask how they're going to recognize each other, but Salt always thinks of things like that, so he's sure they'll be something. If he has to wear a giant sign with his screename on it, he'll do it gladly.  
  
He snickers to himself and starts thinking about what he's going to tell Missouri.

 

  
'Dinner sounds great. My best friend, who has seen too many movies, suggests we carry some sort of flower. You up for it or is it too gay for you?'  
  
Sam chuckles softly, remember how much Dman hates everything that smells even faintly of chick flick moments. A weird excitement is running through his veins, and his anticipation is just as strong as the fear was. Not like he's not afraid anymore, but now at least he has taken his decision and that right there makes him feel better.  
  
He has been dreaming about meeting Dman for so long it's probably going to feel weirdly like deja-vu when it finally happens.

 

  
Dean laughs out loud, because the flower would be the least gay part of this situation.  
  
'Flower's cool. Don't expect me to get a specific kind, though. I'm not enough of a pansy to know the difference.' And he adds another little smiley face, and hell, if Salt doesn't now just how happy he is by how many ridiculous emotes he's using, he doesn't know what's going to convince him.  
  
And then the panic sets in.  
  
Abstractly, he'd considered these possibilities before he'd asked, but now he's wondering what will happen if Salt doesn't like him, if Salt's this super attractive guy (or girl, he's not that picky; Salt just gives off a guy-type vibe) that isn't going to find Dean the least bit interesting. He's mentally going through his closet, trying to figure out what he's going to wear, deciding that he has to wash the car if he's going to be meeting someone.  
  
God, it's like he's some sort of chick or something. 'You are totally Meg Ryan,' he adds, just for good measure.

 

  
'You're a jerk,' Sam answers, snickering to himself. 'See you tomorrow.'  
  
He logs off without even waiting for an answer, because he's too wired up and he's afraid he'll say something he's not supposed to.  
  
It's only when he's sitting at the counter with a cold beer in his hand, deafened by Jo's excited babbling, that he realizes he didn't even ask Dman what his real name is.  
  
Oh, well.  
  
He'll find out tomorrow, anyway.

 

  
Whiskey Creek Wood Fire Grill is a bit more atmospheric than Dean would have liked. The tables are a light-colored wood that the name probably should have suggested, and the booths are upholstered with chocolate brown leather. Each table sits in it's own pool of light, cast down from the hanging light fixtures above. The effect should make the place look like an interrogation room, but it doesn't; rather, the light blends at the edges until the whole place has a sort of manic romantic glow about it.  
  
Dean's already nervous, doesn't need this place's decor messing with the calm he's been trying to build up all day, but his calm and the new knot of nerves that bubbles up inside cancel each other out, until it becomes just a buzz underneath his skin. He can try to ignore it, but it doesn't really work that way.  
  
Ah, well.  
  
He's also pretty sure he looks like a complete idiot. He tries to shove the flower half-under the menu the waitress brings when he's seated, with only the petals still sticking out; it doesn't make him look any less gay. In fact, it probably just looks like he's trying to cover up the fact that he looks gay, which is kind of the truth, but still--  
  
He needs a beer, right now. After a brief internal struggle about whether ordering one would be cheap and make Salt think less of him, he decides that if he doesn't at least have something, he's going to be so freaked out by the time Salt does arrive that he can't speak, so. Alcohol it is.  
  
Dean keeps craning his neck to see the people coming through the door; he's situated himself next to it, not realizing that it makes it more difficult to spot and be spotted. But he's doing his best to hold it together every time the door swings open to let the cold night air in.

 

  
Jo is wearing a purple dress that barely covers her knees, and her hair is styled up. The light blue of her eyeshadow underlines her intense eyes, and she doesn't look like the tomboy Sam used to outrun in the yard when they were kids anymore.  
  
She's a woman now, and if the way Ash's gaze softens every time it stops on her is any indication, Sam is not the only one who noticed. He's happy about it: Ash is a nerd, and a little rough around the edges, but he's kind and a good man. There's no doubt he'll treat Jo right.  
  
Sam shifts nervously, feeling out of place with his new dark jeans and the white, ironed shirt. He tried to submit his mop of hair to a comb, water and hair gel, but didn't really succeed and now he looks like he's stuck his fingers in a light socket.  
  
He fumbles with his leather belt, a gift from Ellen; it belonged to her dead husband, Jo's father, and Sam is proud of wearing it. Doesn't make him feel any less of a freaky sasquatch, though.  
  
He licks his lower lip, shivering a little in the cold night breeze as he and Jo wait for Ash to park their van. After a few minutes, he finally hops towards them, wearing a black vest on a white wife-beater and looking like a drunk reject even if he's stone cold sober.  
  
"Let's do this thing!" he exclaims, slamming his open palm against Sam's back with a resounding _crack_. Sam swallows and they step closer, not entering yet but surveying the area from outside, which is made easy by the large glass windows.  
  
Jo points at a very old, fat bald man sitting in the back of the restaurant, and Sam groans while she snickers, just before Ash nudges him and forces Sam's head around to look at a barely sixteen girl with very short hair and a sweater too big for her.  
  
"Guys, come on," Sam hisses through his teeth. "Be serious, will you?"  
  
Jo opens her mouth as if she's about to say something, but then she just-stops. Her eyes go wide as she stares at something right behind Sam, so he turns slowly, half expecting for it to be another joke.  
  
It's not.  
  
It only takes a look for Sam to _know_ that he's looking at Dman. If it wasn't for the black leather jacket he knows is Dman's favorite garment, or the flower almost smashed under the menu, it would be the anticipation and barely hidden excitement on the guy's face to clue him in.  
  
"Fuck," Ash mutters. "Check _that_ out! I'd go gay for that."  
  
Jo nods, still in shock. "You and me both."  
  
Sam's back stiffens, as he feels a suspicious sting in the corners of his eyes before he turns around and stomps away, as fast as he can, his fingers clenching so tight around the simple white daisy he was holding his knuckles go white. Stupid, stupid, _stupid_.  
  
"What the hell?!" Ash exclaims, breathless, once he and Jo reach him. "Why didn't you talk to him?!"  
  
Sam looks at them, his eyes watery and filled with shadows and regrets. "I couldn't. Guys, I couldn't. Have-have you _seen_ him?!"  
  
Jo blinks. "Yeah, Sam, we did. He's drop-dead gorgeous." Sam swallows.  
  
"Exactly."  
  
Jo looks confused, so Sam just sighs and lays against the cold metal of the van before explaining. "Girls that look like you don't understand. I keep thinking that if I gain ten pounds of muscle, or wear better clothes maybe it would make a difference, but... I know the truth. I'll never be good enough, not for someone like him."  
  
Ash snorts. "I'm sorry, man, but that's bullshit. You're the smartest person that I know-after myself, of course."  
  
Jo glares at him and then grabs Sam's arm. "You make everyone around you happy, Sam, and you have so much to offer. To say you don't because of how you look is just..."  
  
"Is just total bullshit, as I said," Ash finishes, shrugging.  
  
Sam narrows his eyes. "I didn't say I don't have a lot to offer, I said that people will never know because they don't _see_ me. How many times has that happened to you, Jo?"  
  
The girl falls silent, unable to answer, and Sam nods sadly to himself.  
  
"So until that happens, until you're told time and time again that your place in life is in the background, don't tell me it's bullshit, because you don't know."  
  
Ash clears his throat, awkwardly, but Sam just sighs again. "Let's go back home, okay? Please."

 

  
Dean waits. And waits. And waits, until it's past the time they arranged, past dinnertime, and there are three empty bottles on the table in front of him. The flower's even wilted.  
  
Maybe something happened. That's the only reason he (or she) wouldn't be here, right? Something must have happened. Or maybe... maybe he wasn't ever really coming.  
  
This was stupid. It was a stupid thing to ask, and now Dean's destroyed what they had in the hopes of finding something that could never be. He waits fifteen more minutes and then pays his bill. The waitress gives him a look which tells him that she's all too used to the feeling herself, but Dean can't bring himself to give her a second glance.  
  
On his way out of the door, he catches sight of his reflection and stands for a minute, just looking. He doesn't think he's half bad, but he could be wrong. Maybe Salt, as previously anticipated, was a hot supermodel-type, took one look at Dean and fled. Maybe he was embarrassed to even be associating with someone so horrible.  
  
Maybe he doesn't really know Salt at all. The internet is an anonymous place, a dangerous place. It's way too easy to pretend to be someone else.  
  
The parking lot is lit by a single streetlamp, and Dean keeps his eyes glued to the pavement. It's only after the toe of his boot scuffs over something that he focuses in and looks down to find what it is.  
  
It's a flower. The petals are smashed, stem broken. It's been run over by several different cars and stepped on by more than a few people, but it's still recognizable as a flower. Dean picks it up, looks at it closely for a second, and then drops it again, closes his eyes.  
  
That's it, then. Salt was here, saw him, and left. Damn it.  
  
It takes the remainder of the trip to the car for Dean to convince himself he's an idiot, halfway home for him to convince himself that he's a horrible person and that whoever Salt is, he doesn't deserve them.  
  
When he finally does close his apartment door behind him, he immediately heads to the office. maybe it's habit by now, second-nature because he's done it so many times. Either way, he boots up the computer, waits until Messenger logs him in.  
He didn't expect Salt to be on, really he didn't. Nevertheless, he clicks on the gray, faded-out username and hovers over the keyboard like he's going to type something, until he realizes that he has nothing to say. Nothing he can say, and fuck it.  
  
There's a bottle of vodka in the fridge, calling to him, and by the time the sun rises it's mostly gone.

  


  
Ellen's mouth is a thin line as Sam stands in front of her. "Will you run that by me again?" she asks, her tone cold and a little pissed, and Sam looks up, surprised.  
  
"Wasn't I clear enough?" he asks, but Ellen narrows her eyes.  
  
"Oh, you were clear, Sam," she answers, slowly. "You were so clear that I don't know what's keeping me from punching you. Don't you realize how selfish you've been?!"  
  
Her voice is low, but Sam is hit by it as if she was screaming. "You didn't see him, okay? You don't know how it felt to look at him and knowing-"  
  
"Goddammit, Sam, will you stop thinking about how you felt and start thinking about him, uh? How do you think _he_ felt, waiting for hours someone who never comes?!"  
  
Sam swallows. He didn't stop long enough to figure that one out. He's too stubborn to admit it, though. "I did both of us a favor, Ellen. He will understand it, eventually."  
  
Ellen tries to say something else, but Sam's not listening anymore. "Can you finish here?" he asks, and Jo nods, without even looking at him as he leaves the bar, slamming the door on his way out.  
  
Ellen throws a glance at her, but they both can only shrug and keep doing their chores.

 

  
That afternoon, after Dean's downed a handful of painkillers to dull the throbbing in his head enough to even look at the screen, Dean goes in to the computer. He waits a minute, stares at the blinking line until it's driving him insane with the way it's mocking him.  
  
And then he starts out, 'Hey. I didn't catch you last night in North Platte. Everything okay?' He hopes that feigning innocence will get Salt to answer him, out of pity if nothing else. He's still offline but Dean waits anyway, until he absolutely has to go back and lie down.  
  
When he wakes again, he goes to check. And still nothing. Just his message, still sitting there, looking lonely. He remembers all of their previous conversations, how he was always the one to take initiative, and closes his eyes for a moment before adding to it, 'I think you were there. I think you saw me and left. Please answer.'  
  
And then he waits some more, until he's done enough waiting that he's thoroughly sick with it and goes to find something else to do that doesn't involve alcohol, or computers, or anything to do with Salt.

 

  
There shouldn't be anyone left in the bar, but when the computer beeps, someone is still there. He stares at the screen, detached. So Dman is playing it cool, huh.  
  
And yeah, he knows that it's probably better this way, for all the parts involved, because this situation smells danger and pain and heartbreak, but still. He can't bring himself to step away.  
  
Maybe it's some sort of weird, sick curiosity, but he stays, sitting in front of the computer, waiting. Then, just as he's gotten tired and is thinking about just turning the damn machine off, the message appears. He reads it again and again, until he can almost imagine the guy they saw at the restaurant pronouncing those words, before taking a deep breath and typing an answer.  
  
'What's it to you?'

 

  
He's forgotten that he left his speakers on. He's in the middle of some infomercial about laundry soap when the sound resonates through the computer speakers in the other room.  
  
Dean almost, almost doesn't go to check it. He's almost lost faith that Salt would ever contact him again. But he does, still nursing the small amount of stupid, trampled hope in his chest.  
  
But when he gets there, it flickers out.  
  
His fingers hover over the keys for a moment, trying to disconnect enough to answer this politely. Hell, if Salt had answered like that to his face, he'd be punching the guy in his pretty, pretty face. It takes another few seconds for the reply to work its way out of the anger that Dean so badly wants to let loose on something.  
  
'Not good enough for you? Couldn't even find it in you to say something to me, even after we've talked for so long? What the hell is your problem?' And, okay. Not exactly polite. But it's definitely better than the first, knee-jerk response.

  


  
His mouth twitches. The guy has guts. And pride. Despite not wanting to, he sort of likes him.  
  
'What if it was the other way around, loverboy? What if it was me who's not good enough for you? What if I didn't have the courage to walk up to your gorgeous face and girlishly long lashes? What then?' He chuckles to himself.  
  
Not really something he'd say, in a normal situation, but it's as they say: _desperate times call for desperate measures._

 

  
Dean stares at the screen like it's suddenly grown two heads, fingers falling away from the keyboard reflexively. The thought has honestly never occurred to him.  
  
His initial reaction is to tell Salt that he's a fucking idiot. He's actually halfway through the sentence before his anger drains away and he erases it, starts again. 'Then I'd tell you that it doesn't matter what you look like, because I know you. And I'd tell you to stop being such a damn coward.'  
  
Dean sends it, almost unaware that he's holding his breath for an answer. Somehow, everything rests on this for reasons Dean can't name. The clock on the wall ticks by seconds agonizingly slowly.

 

  
He stares at the answer. Maybe...  
  
Nah. Really?  
  
He ponders about it for a split second before cracking his knuckles and typing back. 'Okay, then, you giant girl. Listen, and listen good, because this is a one shot deal. Full house or nothing.'  
  
He is about to put _rien ne va plus_ , but that's too much even for him. His plan has so many holes that if he stops to think about it he will just abort the whole thing; luckily, he's not much the thinking type.  
  
Besides, he will have help. Or at least so he hopes.

 

  
Dean watches as the words come up on the screen, five or six different sends that don't make much sense at first. But after reading them, he almost dares to be hopeful, jots down the necessary information and nods to himself.  
  
He really, really hopes this works. Because if it doesn't, he's going to be much, much worse off than before.

 

  
The computer kept ringing, again and again, and Sam has turned the sound off, because how is he supposed to ignore it if it bugs him like that? A little voice in his head reminds him that he could simply _turn off the computer_ , but Sam silences it immediately, despite how reasonable it is.  
  
No matter how hard he tries not to think about it, though, his mind keeps going back to the desperate, demanding call repeating itself on his screen at least 50 times.  
  
'Where are you?'  
  
'Answer me.'  
  
'Please, talk to me, Salt.'  
  
'It's gonna be okay, please, just give me a chance.'  
  
Every single word Dman types is like a bullet through Sam's heart. Ellen was right, he's being selfish and hurting someone who hasn't done anything wrong; Dman doesn't deserve for Sam to act like this, but Sam is the one who knows better, for once.  
  
He has let Dman take control, every step of the way, but this time... this time it's on him. "You will thank me some day," he mutters to the stranger behind the screen.  
  


  


  
  
Dean sighs, shuts the slider over the keyboard on his phone, and tries not to look at it too often. Under the table, his leg is jumping, nervous in a way he wasn't the other night in North Platte. He hopes something happens soon, that either Sam answers or the plan falls through. Something, anything would be better than this.  
  
Unable to resist, he opens the keyboard again and types the words out with just his thumb, 'C'mon, Salt. Please?' And it's exactly like the thirty or so messages he's sent before, but he hopes, like he's hoped every time, that this time something happens.

 

  
"If this guy writes another sappy line, I'm going to throw the computer out of the window," Ash comments, staring at the screen , and Sam gasps, pushing him on the side.  
  
"Get away, you freak! That's personal!" he states, crossing his arms and glaring at Ash, but the man just shrugs.  
  
"If it was personal, it wouldn't be popping on a shared computer, Sam," Ash retorts. "Besides, you obviously don't care about this guy, so what's the harm in mocking him a little?"  
  
"I-you know that it's not like that," Sam says, without looking at him.  
  
Ash arches an eyebrow. "Oh, really? Because I thought that leaving his sorry ass wondering for hours about what was wrong with him meant you didn't care."  
  
Sam cringes inwardly at Ash's words. It's so true.

 

  
Again, there's no answer. Dean's almost done with this, almost tired of playing this game that consists mainly of him pushing until he can't anymore and getting nothing in return. He's about to just head home and deal with the consequences (if there are any) later.  
  
'Please?' He types out, just that, and doesn't even know if he should hope or not.

 

  
Sam sees the umpteenth message pop up, and decides he has had enough and turns the computer off. "I can't do this," he murmurs, so low that it's probably not meant for anyone else, but Ash hears him and steps closer.  
  
"Do what?" he inquires.  
  
"This!" Sam exclaims, his arms wide open to embrace the whole room, the computer, his failure. "Dman, the internet, running away from the fucking best thing of my life. All of it."  
  
He deflates and lowers his head, letting his long bangs fall in front of his face to hide his eyes. Ash's gaze softens.  
  
"What's the problem here, Sam? I mean, the real one?" he asks, his voice more serious than Sam has ever heard. "I know you well enough to be able to say you're not a coward."  
  
Sam sighs and approaches the counter, noticing for the first time how packed the bar is tonight. "Maybe I am," he answers.  
"Maybe I'm not as strong as you thought. As _I_ thought. Dman makes me feel things I've never felt before, he makes me want to be a better man just because I know he has faith in me and I would do anything not to disappoint him."  
  
He swallows. "That's why I can't meet him. I couldn't take a forced smile, a condescending expression and a few minutes of awkward, uncomfortable conversation before he walks away from my life."  
  
His fists are clenched, and his jaw is trembling when Sam lifts his eyes on Ash. "You understand, don't you?" he inquires, and Ash's eyes go wide.  
  
"Holy shit, Samantha, you're in love with him."  
  
Sam gasps loudly and takes a step back, hurriedly, tripping on a chair in his haste to shaking his head and flailing his long arms. "Wha-no! I-of course not, what are you talking about?!" He laughs, but his laughter sounds almost hysterical and Ash flinches.

 

  
Dean hears his cue even from halfway across the crowded bar; he hears it, and it makes him send up a silent prayer of thanks to whoever lies above. The thrill that runs up his spine has a life of his own, and he shivers, anticipation and elation and the hope that this goes the way he knows it will.  
  
He stands up, winds his way around chairs and booths and finds himself leaning on the bar. Salt (Sam? Is that what Ash called him?) is just beyond, still locked in his conversation with Ash, and he listens, waits for his chance to jump in.

 

  
"Sam..." Ash starts, but Sam lifts a hand, effectively stopping him.  
  
"No, Ash. Just-no. Please. You've seen him, you know that there's no way this is ever going to work. Drop it." And with these words, he steps behind the counter to help Jo serve a few patrons.  
  
Apparently, Ash doesn't know the meaning of _drop it_ , because he follows him and grabs Sam's shoulder, forcing him to turn. "You're beautiful, Sam. In your own way, which might be different from Dman's, but you are."  
  
Sam chuckles, bitterly. "Well, I don't know about that."  
  
"I do," Dean says, and even though it's loud in the bar, he knows Sam heard him from the way he stiffens.  
  
Sam's heart skips a beat, because _it can't be_ , but somehow he knows it is even before he turns. That voice, a voice Sam has never heard before but he could recognize amongst a thousand, simply because of the way it washes over him, almost shielding him from harm, keeping him safe.  
  
That voice makes him feel safe and he thinks, not for the first time, how stupid he has been for not taking a chance.  
Apparently Dman has decided to do so himself, as usual. Sam would be confused as for how the guy found him, but the shit-eating grin on Ash's face tells him everything he needs to know, so he slowly turns.  
  
He doesn't look up, he just stares at Dman's big hands on the counter. "Hey," he murmurs, his cheeks already burning.  
  
Dean smiles, because he can't not when faced with this. He immediately loves the blush creeping up from Sam's neck, wonders if he blushes like that all over and knows that he wants to know, more than he's possible ever wanted anything.  
There'll be time for that. There'll be time for everything, because now that Dean has Sam in his sights, he's not letting him go.  
  
"You're everything I thought you'd be," he says, not even caring how stupid it sounds, because it's true.

 

  
_Uriel is waving his hand dismissively even before it's obvious what the outcome is going to be. "Dean was professionally successful, here, and human nature forces humans to go after security and money. It's clear what Sam was looking for, here."  
  
Castiel blinks. "You don't really believe that."  
  
"Of course I do!" Uriel snaps, before recovering his usual composure. He's going to make sure that Dean is no role model, next time.  
  
**We'll see what you will have to offer then, you pompous bastard** he thinks, rubbing his hands together._

 

  
**TBC...**


	5. ~ IV. 20% Strength ~

  
The sun beats down on the asphalt, and even the clouds can’t keep it from being as hot as humanly possible in July in Oklahoma. Sam has a duffel bag thrown over his shoulder, about ten dollars in his wallet, and his thumb out as he walks down the highway. He’d managed to get this far down from Kansas, taking rides where he could get them. Mostly with creepy old men, and he really doesn’t mind it that much. Expects it, really, because he is hitchhiking after all.  
  
But still.  
  
His shoes are about worn through, and pretty soon he’s going to find a way to either buy some or steal some. His feet feel like they’re on fire. Sweat runs down the back of his neck, makes a steady trail down his spine and his hair (which he’s going to have to cut at some point, because it is too long to be out in the sun all day) is soaked with sweat.  
  
He’s pretty sure he also stinks to high heaven, but he has yet to find one of those fancy truck stops with the showers in the back and/or a high school gym he can con his way into. It’s on his agenda, right after getting a lift to the nearest bus station.  
  
Sam plans to head out to California, find some work in the great American west somewhere. But it’s the getting there that’s the problem; he doesn’t want to end up on the wrong side of the law if he doesn’t have to, and… well, his father’s militant training didn’t include instructions on hotwiring a car.  
  
So he’s stuck like this until he can get it changed.  
  
Oddly enough, he is at peace with that. Long ago, he’d discovered that anywhere would probably be better than being at home with his father, and he was just finding out he was right. Sure, the conditions weren’t ideal, but it was something.  
  
And there was no place to go but up, right? Hitchhiking on the highway, that was pretty low on the totem pole.  
  
He was even getting used to the hunger, constantly gnawing at the pit of his stomach. He’d learned to block it out, to listen to the whiz of cars passing and the other sounds of the outdoors and feel the wind and the heat on his face before the hunger. It’d be inconvenient later, but right now it was saving him from going crazy.  
  
Another group of cars passes, and he sticks his thumb out yet again. He doesn’t expect anyone to pull over, but he had to try, had to hope that there was someone, at least, who either doesn’t watch late night specials on picking up strangers or is savvy enough with a gun to know that Sam wouldn’t get very far if he tried anything.  
  
Whichever came first; Sam really wasn’t picky.  
  
It stays like that, slow on the highway for the next few hours. Strangely enough, he’d begun to recognize that these types of things had shifts like everything else. Didn’t seem like that would be important, but it was important enough. Finally, just as dusk is settling in and Sam is sussing out a safe bush to sleep behind, a group of cars passes and he sticks out his thumb like usual.  
  
But this time, a semi pulls off ahead along the road, engine roaring as the other car sounds fade over the hill. The cab is sleek, black, and the trailer has no company name stamped across it. Sam’s willing to bet an independent, then. The trucker honks his horn, deafening, and Sam runs to catch up to the passenger door. 

 

  
Dean is not in the habit of picking up passengers. In fact, he normally avoids them like the plague; he prefers to be alone when he’s hauling long hours and in his experience, the only thing passengers do is complain.  
  
Which doesn’t really explain why he pulls off for this kid.  
  
He knows this part of the country probably too well, could navigate it with his eyes closed. There isn’t anywhere to stop for another few hours, and the sun is steadily setting. This kid is going to be out here for the night – considering the state of him, it’s probably not the first time, but that’s beside the point. Contrary to popular belief, Dean does have compassion for a fellow human being. He’s going to be driving for hours yet, but there’s no reason why this kid can’t come along.  
  
Again given the state of him, he’s not likely to complain. Of course, Dean could be wrong, but as much as he likes being alone when he’s driving nights, it does get lonely some times.  
  
So he turns down the Ozzy blaring from his speakers and watches the kid get taller and taller in the side mirror.  
  
The passenger-side door pops open, and even from his side Dean can see the various wrappers and bottles slide out and hit the asphalt. Apparently he forgot to clean his cab out last time he stopped. Huh. Even ankle-deep in garbage, the kid has reason to be thankful, though – he was willing to bet that his cab looked more inviting than whatever patch of ground the kid’d been considering sleeping on.  
  
Before he climbs up, the kid picks up the trash that’d fallen out, places it almost reverently back where it was before the door opened. Dean only just resists the urge to role his eyes.  
  
“Where you headed?” Dean asks, when his new passenger finally gets himself up into the cab and shuts the door behind him. Wherever it is, Dean sincerely hopes it has a shower – he knows he doesn’t exactly smell like roses, but the kid sure looks like he could use it.  
  
“Anywhere that has a bus station,” is his reply, which isn’t really helpful. How is Dean supposed to know where the nearest bus station is? “Thanks, by the way.”  
  
“Don’t mention it.” Dean guides the rig back onto the highway and hits the gas to get his speed back. The cab is airtight; inside, they can hardly hear the roar of the wind as the truck carves its way through the air. But it makes it eerily silent; he itches to turn the radio back up, already regretting his impulsive decision to pick up a 'hiker.  
  
It’s another few miles until he finally breaks and has to say something to curb the awkward silence. He doesn’t want to press, but there has to be something; going all night with just the sound of their breathing is going to be hell if that’s how it goes. “So, you got a name?”  
  
The kid stirs, shifting his feet around in the trash in the foot well. “Sam. You?”  
  
Oh, this is going _great_.  
  
“Dean,” Dean almost sighs. “So, Sam. Where’s the bus taking you?” By now, the sun’s gone. In the middle of the night in Oklahoma, the road is only lit by the moon and the headlights; even if Dean wanted to be polite and actually look at Sam as he’s speaking to him, there’s no way there’d be anything to see. Besides, the plains come alive at night. It isn’t that running over an animal would do much damage to the rig, and it’s unlikely that any animal would be trying to cross a major highway even at night, but it’s the principle.  
  
“California.” Sam leaves it at that. Dean wants to ask what’s so important in California, but Sam’s voice is low, tired. From experience, Dean knows that these seats aren’t the most comfortable place to sleep.  
  
“There’s a sleeper in the back if you want. I’ll let you know when we get somewhere.”

 

  
Sam can hardly believe his luck. He’s had rides with truckers before, but not usually ones so generous. And he was going to sleep in something close to a real bed for the first time in a long time.  
  
Of course, he can’t help thinking there’s a catch. From the brief glance he’d had of his host before the sun had set, he’d guess this guy, Dean, was more of the savvy-with-a-gun type than the didn’t-watch-late-night-specials type.  
  
Not that Sam’s going to try anything, but it’s good to know where he stands.  
  
He throws his duffel back onto the mattress ahead of himself, thanks Dean and climbs back. He’s never been allowed inside a cab’s sleeper before (Sam hadn’t dare slept when he was riding with the other truckers), but he imagines that this one is pretty nice as far as sleepers go. It’s more like an apartment back here than an extension of the cab; everything anyone could ever need is situated in the small space.  
  
When he settles back into the mattress, he turns so he can watch the sky out the windshield past the front seats. The stars are tiny pinpricks even from here, and Sam guesses there’s more than a few miles before they hit anything that resembles a truck stop.  
  
And, in fact, he wakes up again before they hit anything at all. The scenery hasn’t changed all that much, just a different stretch of plains and highway than the one they’ve just left behind. Sam climbs back into the passenger seat but leaves his duffel back on the mattress. Perhaps sleep has left him with a false sense of security.  
  
“Should be a truck stop in about fifteen miles. I’m gonna stop there for the night, I think.”  
  
Sam nods, realizes he can’t be seen, and says, “Okay.” He worries briefly about where he’s going to stay, but these places are bound to have benches and stuff. He can find somewhere if he absolutely has to.  
  
More silence, and Sam isn’t sure he should break it; mostly, drivers like their silence and their privacy. He’s just taking up space.  
  
Surprisingly, it’s Dean who speaks first. “Uh, the place we’re gonna stop… it’s got good amenities, but it’s still pretty rough. So long on the road without anyone to talk to makes people mean, you know?” Dean clears his throat. “If you still want to find somewhere with a station, we can hit a city tomorrow. But maybe you should let me do the talking in here.”  
  
Sam doesn’t know what to make of that. What kind of place are they stopping, anyway? He hasn’t been to many truck stops, true, but from his experience they’re mostly filled with older, tired-eyed men who stay hunched over their coffee mugs and only speak to each other if they can’t help it. Even so, Dean is bound to have more experience (even though he honestly doesn’t look much older than Sam himself is, how’d that happen?), and he hasn’t been anything but generous so far.  
  
“Sure,” Sam says, shrugging. Again, he realizes he can’t be seen, but it’s more for his own benefit. “Think they’ll have showers?”  
  
“Should, yeah.”  
  
“Great.” If Dean wants to take the lead, Sam’s okay with it. The only thing he wants out of the deal is some quality time with about a year’s supply of hot water. He’s almost forgotten what his skin feels like when it isn’t covered with dried sweat, dirt and grime.

 

  
The glow from the stadium lamps come into view miles before the truck stop itself does. Sam wonders what time it is; most of the rigs are parked, but the interiors are dark. There are two other trucks at the diesel pumps, drivers nowhere in sight. The awning over the diesel pumps has the Shell logo mounted on it, but the building that sits across the parking lot has a more modest sign: Harvelle’s.  
  
Sam thinks it sounds more like a bar than a truck stop, but as long as it has a shower he doesn’t really care what it’s called. The lights on inside are nearly blinding after so long with only the rig’s headlights and the stars; he blinks until his eyes adjust, and by the time he can see again, Dean’s parked the truck next to a fancy Peterbilt with a JB Hunt trailer.  
  
“Remember what I said?” Dean asks as he kills the engine. Even if it was barely audible inside the cab, it’s eerily quiet without the steady rumble. Sam grabs his duffel off the sleeper’s mattress.  
  
“Yeah,” he says as he carefully avoids the pile of trash in the floorboard and drops to the asphalt. His legs immediately want to cramp up on him – walking all day and then sitting for however long obviously doesn’t agree with him. Sam makes a small noise of discomfort as he tries to rub the knots out of his muscles. When he looks up, Dean’s already standing up by the truck’s grill, backlit by the beacon that is the truck stop. He’s thrown a bulky leather jacket on, and it makes him look like someone you wouldn’t want to cross.  
  
Sam suddenly feels underdressed. 

 

  
Dean’s been to Harvelle’s several time before. It always seems that he gets to this stretch of highway just before the road gets blurry and he forces himself to sleep.  
  
There’s nearly always trouble.  
  
Tonight it’s going to be in the form of the man in the corner. He watches and Dean and Sam enter through the restaurant-side doors; Dean returns the favor, watches him just as closely and only tears his eyes away to check on Sam.  
  
Under the bright lights, Sam looks young, younger than Dean thought at first. He’s got to be barely legal. Sam’s tall, taller than Dean, and just starting to bulk up past the whipcord muscle that makes him look less threatening than it should.  
  
He’s well-built, and Dean isn’t the only one noticing.  
  
Dean pays for as much hot water as Sam could want at the counter and shows him where the showers are, a hallway situated between the restaurant and general store. There are bathrooms on one side of the hallway and two shower rooms on the other, and they’ve jammed a tiny booth into the back corner.  
  
The purpose of the booth has never been entirely clear, but Dean’s thankful for it just then. Once he gets Sam set in the shower room, he gets himself a cup of coffee and returns there.  
  
It isn’t that he feels obligated to protect Sam; he picked him up, yeah, but if he’s used to trusting truckers he’s got to know what he’s getting himself into. They aren’t generally a bad bunch but, like any group, there’s the occasional lonely wacko who doesn’t understand the concept of personal space. Regardless of whether Sam knows that or not, he’s still just a kid.  
  
And because Dean has some sort of protective streak, he’s going to make sure Sam gets where he’s going safely. If that means California… well, he’s been meaning to get out there for a while now. He’ll drop the load he’s carrying in Reno and take Sam where he needs to go.  
  
The hallway’s only light is a dim, bare bulb hanging from the ceiling in the exact center. It isn’t nearly as bright as the rest of the place. Someone standing at the mouth of the hallway casts a long shadow, and when Dean looks up he recognizes the man from the corner with the wandering eyes. He pauses when he notices Dean standing guard and smiles, sharp and predatory.  
  
He keeps coming, and by the time he gets to the men’s room door, Dean is on his feet. He stares, hard, and the man stares right back as he reaches for the handle and pushes the door open.  
  
It’s a horrible cover-up for his intention. If Dean was just a little less tired, he’d have welcomed the fight. As it is, he stays standing until the man emerges; with one last challenging glance, he retreats back into the restaurant.  
  
Dean watches until he’s out of sight and sits back down, more alert than before. Moments later, one of the waitresses pokes her head around the corner and, seeing it clear except for him, starts down. Dean knows her, in a way; they sort of had a thing once. She’s blonde, petite, and doesn’t look old enough to be serving the alcohol on the menu.  
  
“Watch out for that guy,” she says as she leans back against the wall and pulls a cigarette from one of her pockets. She lights up, takes a puff and closes her eyes as she exhales the smoke. “You don’t wanna get on Gordon’s bad side.”  
  
“I think I can take care of him,” he replies. “You supposed to be smoking in here?” Her name is something short, meant to be cute but for the life of him he can’t remember it. Jill, maybe?  
  
Maybe-Jill grins. “What my mother doesn’t know won’t hurt her.” She takes another few puffs of her cigarette in silent, eyes closed, enjoying her break. In the silence, Dean hears the water kick off in the shower room. At the same time, a voice echoes back to them, “Johanna Beth, you better not be smoking down there!”  
  
And that’s it, it’s Jo. She huffs, takes one last puff and drops the butt to the floor, stubs it out with the toe of her book. “Duty calls,” she sighs, exhales. “I’d keep an eye on your boy if I were you.” Then she’s gone, leaving behind the thick smell of tobacco and words that don’t quite register just then, don’t have the chance because next moment Sam steps into the hallway.  
  
His clothes are clean and he looks tired, content. “Thanks,” is the first thing he says, and for a second Dean’s sure he means Gordon.  
  
“Oh,” he says, once he catches up. “No problem. ‘Fraid we’re gonna have to sleep in the truck, though.”  
  
“S’fine. Better than what I expected.” Sam slings his duffel over his shoulder. “Should I sit here while you…?”  
  
Dean would love a hot shower, but he doesn’t like the look of the customers tonight. He can wait for Albuquerque; he’s sure they can make it by tomorrow night. “Nah. I just want sleep. You clean up nice, though.” It’s mean to be teasing, but he realizes after he says it that he means it. 

 

  
“Seat reclines a bit,” Dean explains. Sam was kind of hoping to go another few hours on the sleeper, but Dean’s been driving all day so it makes more sense. As if he’s said it out loud, Dean adds, “Usually I’d sleep up here and give you the sleeper, but I’ve gone longer than I probably should’ve.”  
  
“Don’t worry about it.” Sam settles back into the seat and tries to get comfortable. Dean closes his door and opens a separate one that Sam realizes leads into the sleeper. He rustles around for a while, logging his hours in his logbook; ten minutes later the cab falls silent and dark, and despite the fact that the seat isn’t all that comfortable, Sam falls asleep almost instantly.

 

  
Sam wakes to the sound of the engine firing in the pallid predawn light. It’s almost unnatural after so much silence, and he realizes hazily that it sounds different than a car engine. The sound echoes around under the large hood. It’s almost eerie.  
  
“Sorry,” Dean apologizes when he notices Sam is awake. “There’s stuff in the back if you’re hungry, but I’m not gonna stop for breakfast until we hit the next diner, at least.”  
  
Sam’s mouth is dry but he’s used to being hungry by now. Plus, Dean’s already paid for him a shower and given him a place to sleep. He doesn’t want to impose.  
  
He slips in and out of sleep for another half hour, then returns the seat to its original position and watches out the window for a while.  
  
“You said you were headed to California, right?”  
  
“Palo Alto,” Sam answers, distracted.  
  
“Huh. You don’t say.”  
  
Sam blinks and looks over. “Why?”  
  
“I’ve got to drop this trailer in Reno before Friday, but my next pick-up is in Palo Alto. Not sure how fast the bus could get you there, but I could get you there before the week’s out.”  
  
Either Sam is extremely stupid or extremely lucky, or maybe one of those proves the other by the fact that he isn’t able to tell. He considers. At this point, he doesn’t have enough money to ride even the city bus for a day, not to mention a bus ticket. He wasn’t sure where he was planning to get money, but if he could ride with Dean it would eliminate the need for it.  
  
Of course, he’d have to come up with the money at the end of the road, but whether Dean is good with a gun or not, Palo Alto is a fair-sized place. It’d be easy to get lost there.  
  
“Yeah, I mean. If you don’t mind paying my way ‘til we get there. My Aunt lives out that way, and I’ll be able to get the money from her to pay you.”  
  
Dean shrugs. “I’m not worried about you paying me just now. Job pays well and I got nothing to spend it on. You’re just giving me an excuse to use it.”  
  
“It’s just you?” Sam doesn’t mean to pry, but he wants to change the subject and it’s pretty unusual. Don’t these guys usually have families and such to go home to?  
  
“Just me. My dad got me started in this when I was young. He-“ Dean clears his throat. “He died about a year back, so now it’s just me.”  
  
“And you never considered doing anything else?”  
  
Dean laughs, and there’s a not-quite bitter edge to it. “It becomes a lifestyle after a while. I think I’d go crazy if I tried living in one place for too long.”  
  
And that’s how it starts. The miles fly by as they talk. Sam figures as long as they’re crossing the country, they might as well be friendly with each other. Talking about his family helps take the sting of leaving away, and Dean hasn’t had someone to talk to in far too long – the radio remains clicked off because it might interrupt their conversation if it was on.  
  
Sam appreciates that. 

 

  
Brunch is Ihop just outside of Vega and dinner puts them within striking distance of Albuquerque. Dean is rather proud of himself. But it wasn’t such a bad drive, especially with Sam for company.  
  
The day passes fairly quickly , not measured by miles or cities as usual but the flow of their conversations, broken only by the few stops they make and the naps Sam takes. Dean's almost forgotten how to do this, how to fill the air with something other than an endless array of classic rock songs; almost forgotten how effortless it is when there's a person filling that space instead of silence.  
  
Somewhere between Shamrock and Tucumcari, he realizes that he’s actually going to miss Sam when he’s gone. He doesn’t complain, loves to listen to Dean talk about everything and nothing, and he seems to have a sixth sense for when Dean’s done talking because he almost always fills the silence. And then it’s Dean’s turn to listen, and he really doesn’t mind.  
  
Plus, Sam is beautiful. It isn’t a very productive thing to realize, and Dean half-wishes he’d picked a less-attractive hitchhiker to latch onto. He usually doesn’t have many inclinations in that direction – there are too many pretty women who romanticize his life and are all too willing to show him just how much. But Sam is different.  
  
Not that he’s going to do anything about it. It’d be too cruel to take advantage like that. Sam is young, younger than Dean was when he was Sam’s age; he thinks he has the experience to make him world-weary, but he doesn’t. Not yet, anyway. Sam isn’t naïve, but he doesn’t know enough of the world to be mistrusting.  
  
His willingness to hitch a ride with any random person who’d pick him up on the highway was proof enough of that.  
  
It's only a few hours after dark when Albuquerque rests on the horizon, illuminating the black of the New Mexico sky. A deep, humble exhaustion has settled into his bones, and it's times like these that make him wish he didn't dislike motels so much. An actual bed and a shower that was actually part of a bathroom would do him some good, would do them both some good.  
  
One look at Sam dozing in the passenger seat almost convinces him that the rig will be okay for one night.  
  
It's not a money issue – he'd been telling Sam the trust, he had more money saved than he knew what to do with. Dean just didn't like the truck being out of sight, especially when he was being paid to haul a load for a company. It wasn't his merchandise to lose; his first run out on his own had taught him that. He'd taken a room for the night despite his Dad's warnings, and all it got him was a shitload of stolen furniture he had to reimburse the company for and his cab picked clean.  
  
And the ass-chewing that followed. It wasn't a pleasant thing. But maybe tonight he'll take the front seat and let Sam have the sleeper.  
  
The Flying Jay in Albuquerque is best; doesn't tolerate the shady characters anymore than the other chain stops do. Usually Dean wouldn't mind the cheaper, family-owned places – he can hold his own well enough. With Sam tagging along, though? It was like painting a giant bulls-eye on the kid's back. Flying Jay it was.

 

  
Despite being more expensive (or perhaps because of it), the showers at the Jay were more than decent enough. Dean was confident that no one would bother Sam, so he bought him a cup of coffee and led him to one of the booths in the restaurant as Dean himself took a turn at the shower.  
  
The place was well-known enough that someone'd have to be either extremely cocky or extremely stupid to try anything.  
  
After his shower, Dean stepped back out into the restaurant and scanned the booths, finding Sam exactly where he left him. Only he isn't alone, and it takes Dean maybe five complete seconds to realize who it is.  
  
He'd definitely peg the Gordon guy Jo had warned him about as the extremely stupid type.  
  
He sees red, or maybe green – something that makes his chest knot up with worry and something else that Dean doesn't care to identify, ever. One look at Sam confirms that something is wrong; he's uncomfortable, looking everywhere except at Gordon, who's taken it upon himself to sit across from him. The moment his eyes fall on Dean, Dean's protective streak – usually dormant but in specific circumstances – kicks into overdrive.  
  
As Dean approaches, Gordon looks up, probably tracking Sam's gaze. He doesn't look surprised, but he leers, sizing Dean up for a threat. A half-second passes where Dean has to dig his fingernails into his own palms to stop himself from taking violent action right there, and then Gordon gives him the same grin as the night before; sharp,dangerous. He doesn't take Dean for much of a challenge.  
  
Dean feels the cold metal of the gun barrel on the small of his back like a brand, and hopes for violence.

 

  
Sam would like to think that he doesn't need rescuing, but when Dean slides into the booth next to him, glaring openly at the man who'd invited himself into Sam's company, the feeling flooding him is too much like relief to prove anything. He does need rescuing, and if he has to have his ability to take care of himself challenged he'd really like to have Dean at his back.  
  
It's sort of satisfying, and it's childish enough that Sam wants to kill the thought before it has a chance to spread.  
  
Dean drops his bag onto the floor at Sam's feet (out of the way, Sam notices, in case he has to stand up) and throws his arm along the plastic back of the booth like it's nothing. There's something in that Sam's deliberately not reading into. It's only cautionary, he tells himself.  
  
Gordon is the first to speak, and his quiet, measured words make Sam's skin crawl. “Dean Winchester. I've heard about you, but I can't help thinking the legends might have gotten a few things wrong.” He says the word 'legend' like it's something to mock, a gross overstatement that's only meant to harm.  
  
“Is that so?” Dean asks, and it's almost casual but for the steel belying the words.  
  
“Mm. I was just telling your boy here about what it's like to shotgun with someone who actually knows what he's doing.”  
  
Those weren't exactly the words he used. Sam feels the blush creeping from the back of his neck as Dean watches him like he's trying to see right through to something beyond.  
  
“How about this?” Dean asks, carefully bringing the arm perilously close to Sam's shoulders back down to the table. He leans forward, braces himself on his elbows. When he speaks, his voice is dark, liquid, violence promised in every syllable. “You even think about laying a hand on my boy and I'll rearrange your face.”  
  
If it was anyone else saying the words, they wouldn't sound so convincing. If it was anybody else saying the words, Sam might have been able to overlook it. As it is, he repeats it over and over in his head, what Dean called him, and each time it gets worse, gets more twisted.  
  
The rest of the conversation is background noise, because Sam's brain is working harder than it has in weeks at trying to come up with a conclusion.  
  
They were fighting over him, for lack of a better term; it didn't sound any better in his head than it would of if he'd spoken out loud. Gordon had painted a pretty clear picture of what he wanted from Sam, and up until this point Sam could have confidently said that Dean defended him because they were traveling companions, friends even. If nothing else, they were friendly.  
  
But he wasn't property to be haggled over and sold to the highest bidder. He didn't belong to anyone, didn't owe--  
  
He did. He owed Dean for the ride to California, and even if he was told he wasn't expected to pay now... people didn't do anything for free, not anymore. Besides, it's not like Sam could magically come up with the money to pay for the ride between here and California.  
  
So he was expected the pay the way Gordon would have expected him to pay. Only makes sense, even over the swell of nausea rising in Sam's stomach. No one is as nice as Dean, not anymore, not unless they wanted something.  
  
He'd seen the way Dean looked at him when they stopped, the way Dean watched him, eyes burning into Sam's back as he spent the rest of his money on what refreshments Dean didn't carry in the cab. Sam had thought it was his imagination, wishful thinking if absolutely nothing else. But now it made sense, all of it.  
  
Eventually, Gordon left. Sam didn't see him go, but Dean retreated to the other side of the table in his absence. They only sat for a few more minutes in the restaurant, but it was enough to cement Sam's plan in his mind. Wasn't enough, maybe, to get up enough courage to do what he had to do, but he could get past that when he absolutely had to.  
  
The walk back to the truck was silent. Dean watched him from the corner of his eye the way Sam watched Dean from the corner of his.

 

  
The red edges haven't faded from his vision when they get back to the truck. He goes straight for his sleeper without remembering that Sam was supposed to sleep there tonight. Sam is quiet, but he could be tired, maybe shaken from whatever Gordon was telling him before Dean came into the picture.  
  
He doesn't want to know, he really doesn't.  
  
The light clicks off immediately; he'll log tomorrow and it'll be just as accurate. Living the life so long develops patterns, and Dean's learned to memorize his start times, end times, and calculate the number of miles traveled. It wasn't a problem.  
  
If he couldn't punch someone, he'd settle for sleep. And he's just about there when there's the sound of Sam moving around, stepping back behind the seats. Wrappers crinkle under his feet; he kicks aluminum cans out of his way and generally makes himself known. Whether on purpose or not, Dean's not at liberty to say. He keeps still and watches Sam with one eye in the dark.  
  
But Sam doesn't go for the fridge or the microwave or anything else. He heads straight for the sleeper, tipping the mattress when he settles on the edge and watches Dean like a child would watch a parent he was afraid to wake.  
  
Dean props himself on his elbows, squinting into the darkness to see Sam's face. He wishes he hadn't pulled the blackout screen over the windshield; there are a few centimeters on either side of the screen that let in just enough light to see Sam's silhouette.  
  
“Hey,” he says when Sam hasn't spoken, just sits there. It's barely more than a whisper but it echoes in the cab.  
  
But then the springs shift and Sam moves, sliding against the dark. Dean can feel his heat against him in a line of static; when Sam comes to a rest, he's pressed against Dean's side.  
  
“Hey,” Sam replies. His voice is inches from Dean's face, off to the left but so close he can feel the hot puff of Sam's breath. There's exactly have a second to consider this before Sam moves into his space in the dark, face pressed close as he kisses Dean.  
  
It isn't clumsy, not exactly; Sam doesn't have the experience that Dean does, but that doesn't mean he's bad at it, all pressure and the slide of lips, quick like they're going to get caught any moment.  
  
Dean realizes like a punch to the gut that he should be stopping this. It's not like he's opposed, but he's supposed to be protecting Sam, even if it's from himself. This isn't helping.  
  
Sam doesn't realize what he's doing, can't if he's doing this.  
  
It takes a lot of willpower to make himself push Sam away, to plant a hand on Sam's chest and shove until Sam overbalances enough to have to break contact. He recovers quickly, quicker than Dean expects, and then Sam's back on him.  
  
Dean almost can't this time. Sam feels too good against him, licking his way into Dean's mouth with slow, almost tentative swipes of his tongue. It's calculated and it takes what feels like every last bit of Dean's resolve to pull himself away.  
  
“Hey,” he says again, but his voice is husky, kiss-rough, promising something more.  
  
When Sam finally breaks his silence, his voice is just as wrecked as Dean's, just as hopeless. “Want you,” he says, and it sounds a bit like he's forcing it; not that it isn't true, but that he's hesitant to voice it. Scared of the thing suddenly thickening the air between them. “Please, _please_.”  
  
It's the begging that undoes him, that makes him actually consider their situation. Sam's all heat and pressure where they touch and it's an odd sensation to feel and not see. Dean reaches out, fingertips skating Sam's jaw, and grips his face with a foreign gentleness that comes from a shadowy place deep inside.  
  
“Damnit, Sam,” he breathes, “Don't know what you do to me, do you?” After a beat, he adds, “Are you sure?” just because he has to know, can't not ask when they're at such a vital turning point.  
  
Sam nods, and Dean only knows because he can feel it, can feel Sam moving in his grip. Dean runs his thumb over Sam's chin, finds his mouth and strokes over the seam of Sam's lips for a moment; after the first few passes, Sam opens for him and Dean's thumb sinks inside the wet heat of his mouth.  
  
The sound that claws its way out of Dean's throat is strangled. He won't own up to it later, can't even let himself acknowledge how fucked he is. He's too young to feel like a dirty old man. Hell, he's probably not that much older than Sam is, but the way Sam _is_ makes him feel that much older. In terms of life experience, there are decades between them.  
  
But all of that, even when it's heavy on his mind, doesn't stop him from wanting so badly he can't stop himself. Sam's tongue swirls around the pad of his thumb, and Dean wishes for the thousandth time that there was light in the cab so he could see Sam's obscene mouth around his finger, see the lust dark in his eyes, see how much he wants Dean.  
  
Reluctantly, he pulls his hands away; his thumb slips from Sam's mouth with a slick sound. Next moment, Sam is on him again, kissing him with a renewed sense of urgency. Dean knows he should ask again before he can't stop himself, but it doesn't quite come out when he tries.  
  
“Are... can I see you?”  
  
It's whisper-sweet, almost sticky on Dean's tongue. Somewhere in the past few seconds he's decided that if they're doing this, they're going to do it right. Sam shifts around, blankets himself over Dean with an unexpected ease. He reaches over, fumbling in the dark for the switch on the lamp; something falls off the small pull-out table and skitters to the ground, and Dean huffs out an embarrassingly breathy half-laugh, lowers himself flat on the mattress and reaches blindly for Sam.  
  
His fingers brush shoulder, down over bicep, elbow, forearm, until Dean's looping his fingers loosely around Sam's wrist where he's still fumbling on the nightstand. Next moment, he twines his fingers with Sam's and stretches them both to where the switch should be.  
  
Sam's hand falls away when Dean fiddles with getting the lamp on, and when the light finally comes on he's momentarily blinded by it. Sam grips his bicep reflexively, and for a moment that's all there is.  
  
When Dean opens his eyes, adjusted to the bright, Sam's watching him. His eyes are dark, pupils blown so wide only a thin ring of crystalline hazel is still visible.  
  
Their faces are close, noses almost brushing and Sam's hand still closed around Dean's arm. Sam's eyes are lit with something Dean might call surprise and Dean's pretty sure he himself looks like a starry-eyed idiot in return.  
  
A long time ago, Dean might have thought he could have a life like the drivers he met, with a wife and three kids at home, calls every night and fewer loads to run. Or perhaps, like some, he'd take his wife with him. Not a glorious life for a woman, he realizes, but whomever she was, she'd have to love this life. This life is part of Dean; a pretty large part, his whole life, and if she were to love him she'd have to accept that.  
  
Now he held no illusions. He knew it wasn't going to be like that for him, knew his love life was going to consist of fractured fantasies, lot lizards and quick, hot fucks in the bathroom of whatever stop he decided to rest at.  
  
Sam isn't any of those things. And he can't treat Sam like he is, because Sam is different. He desperately wants Sam to be different.  
  
When Dean kisses him, flat on his back with both hands twisted in Sam's hair, there's no purpose, no real heat in the swirl of his tongue. It is sweet, and slow, more than a little soft. It's one of those life-affirming kisses that people sing about – not in any music Dean listens to, of course, but he remembers bubblegum pop from the days in low spots before he replaced the truck's tape deck.  
  
And Sam goes with it, even when Dean is half-afraid he won't. When California comes, day after tomorrow at the very latest, this is going to hurt like hell. Dean will take care of it with the road, and each mile that rolls by will make it sting less.  
  
That's what he tells himself by way of apology, and stops thinking altogether when Sam nips at him, nicks Dean's lip in a sharp rush of pain and then sucks at the cut, soothes over it with his tongue and feather-light, ridiculous kisses.  
  
Tomorrow there will be a bruise, and when he kisses Sam awake in the morning, it will hurt.  
  
There's something that Dean won't name settling in his limbs, something fierce and protective and it fucking aches. Sam shouldn't have to take charge here, not if Dean's playing the resident dirty old man.  
  
He has to stop himself from thinking, has to literally halt his thought process to nothing but Sam. He pushes him away, gentle, and presses himself as close to the edge of the mattress as he can without falling. Perched on his hip, he whispers to Sam, “Lie down,” and watches him move after a brief, confused pause.  
  
There are too many clothes in the equation right now, too much skin that isn't bare, so before Sam gets settled against the pillows, Dean pulls at the hem of his t-shirt, rucks it up and finally off with Sam's help.  
  
He's a beautiful sight, stretched half-naked on Dean's bed. He's still young enough to have corded muscle rather than the bulk he'll grow into; his shoulders are crazy-broad and his bangs fall forward to shade his eyes.  
  
Dean wonders, briefly, self-deprecatingly, if this would be happening if Sam were less attractive.  
  
He tears his eyes from Sam's exposed skin, plants little kisses to the tip of Sam's nose, the corners of Sam's mouth, the skin of his throat and the tips of his collarbone. He tastes like outside, faint traces of the soap he used in the shower at Harvelle's, like everything that makes sense in Dean's life and a great deal that doesn't.  
  
In the very distant corners of his mind, he knows this kid is fucking him up, knows that soon, not having this is going to rip him apart.  
  
His tongue on Sam's skin, mouthing and whirling over the sweep of his ribs, the taut skin of his belly and lower, inscribes apologies to Sam, to himself, and admonitions because although he doesn't mean to, every glance Sam throws him, every sound that vibrates through his body, makes him love the kid a little more.  
  
God help him.

  


  
It is morning, and there is a warm body cradled in his arms. It takes a second for Dean to register this, another for him to panic, because if there's someone here with him, where's Sam? He doesn't remember drinking last night –  
  
And then he remembers, and Sam shifts in his embrace, rubs deliciously against him and Dean's dick gives a happy, interested twitch.  
  
He cracks one eye open - the cab is still dim, light breaking in all around the blackout screen not nearly enough to make the seats and crammed furniture in the sleeper more than hulking, black figures. Next to him, Sam's face is lax, relaxed with sleep, lips parted lightly.  
  
Dean's smile cracks the cut in his lip open, and he tastes old blood. The spot is tender when he tongues it, raw from use, and he doesn't care enough not to kiss Sam.  
  
It's a slow, languid kiss; Sam's only now beginning to stir, to respond beneath him.  
  
And then Sam's eyes snap open. He goes suddenly, absolutely still, tense, and when Dean pulls back, Sam lets all the air out of his lungs.  
  
Sam pushes, still half-asleep, clumsy. But he's pushing Dean away, and Dean puts as much distance between them as he can. “What...?”  
  
When Sam looks at him, his eyes are blazing even through the sleep-haze. “I think I've paid enough for the lift,” he says, voice cold, and he crawls off the mattress. It hits Dean like a kick to the gut, pieces falling into place like the tumblers in a lock.  
  
Sam's gathering his clothes, tossing his shirt over his head and pulling his jeans up with a quick, violent jerk. Dean sits there, gaping, and the only thing he can do is say “Sam” and “No” until Sam turns to him, glares, and grabs his backpack out of the front seat.  
  
The truck's door slamming shut is a heavy, final sound. 

 

  
Sam stumbles a little when his feet hit the asphalt. Maybe he was a little overeager in getting away, but he doubts anyone could blame him after everything that's happened.  
  
He still has a hard time believing that Dean would do something like that, that Dean would expect it of him. Bitterly, he thinks he should have known that no one would be that nice, that giving without wanting something in return. And after everything, Gordon was right.  
  
Maybe that's what pisses Sam off the most. Maybe it's the pain that shoots up his spine every time he moves, or the sharp, periodic throb from the bruise Dean left on his neck. There's a matching one on his hip, and he almost forgets until his jeans rub the wrong way.  
  
It makes him want to punch something.  
  
Avoiding the real issue works just fine for him, lets him focus on his situation. He has no money. He has no way to get anywhere, because he could hitch another ride, but that'd put him back in the same situation he'd just left, and probably with someone a lot less attractive than Dean.  
  
Damnit, he's fucked, and in more than the obvious way.  
  
There's a bus station a few blocks away; he remembers seeing it, abstractly, on their way in. It didn't register at the time, but he knows it must be close. Sam doesn't have a clear idea of what he'll do when he gets there, but he has no choice. He starts walking.

 

  
Dean stares at the door for a minute, as though the weight of his gaze alone will bring Sam back. It might be a few minutes, might be an hour, but eventually he looks away, looks around at the cab and starts to scoot his way to the edge of the bed. The sheets are still warm where Sam slept in them. He clenches his jaw and pulls on his clothes, tries to ignore the raw, sharp pain in his chest.  
  
He's halfway through visualizing his plan, the plan he now has to default to because Sam is gone. Sam thought that... how could Sam think that? How could Sam think that he ever...?  
  
Maybe it was Dean's fault. Maybe Sam caught him looking, maybe he was sending the wrong vibes, maybe...  
  
Gordon.  
  
Dean hasn't actually considered killing another human before. He's never been mad enough at someone to warrant that sort of wish. But instead of surprise at himself, he's flooded with cold, hard rage.  
  
He moves around in the limited space, throwing on clothes and muttering to himself, dark words of hatred, promises of how thoroughly he's going to fuck Gordon up – and he almost trips over something on the floor.  
  
Frustrated, he glares down at it. It's a small, brown wallet, and not something he's ever seen before. For a moment, all of his anger drains away, and he picks it up, flips it open.  
  
Sam's face smiles up at him from the plastic of his ID – Kansas, but that's the last thing Dean notices. He looks at Sam's picture for a moment, then skims the information printed on it, only feeling slightly like an intruder.  
  
He skims over address, height, and birthdate -- and then stops, suddenly. Dean calculates, quick as he can, and nearly drops Sam's wallet in his haste to close it again, as though covering up the proof will destroy the evidence of what he's done.  
  
Sam isn't as old as Dean thought. Sam is just shy of legal, still fucking jail bait as far as the U.S. Government is concerned. Why is no one looking for him? What kind of father lets his 17-year-old son wander out into the world with a clear conscious?  
  
There's no excuse, not now. There's no reason that Dean can give, even that Sam hates him, or that Sam thinks he's some sort of dirty old man (which, Dean realizes, he now is); no reason to not go looking for him. Because Sam is young, and alone, and without his wallet he has no proof of who he is.  
  
Or any money.  
  
Cautiously, he opens the billfold.  
  
There's about ten dollars in ones and change there, not enough to... shit, not enough to pay for anything that he'll need. Dean hopes Sam has money in his pocket, but he knows he's not fooling himself. Sam is broke. And alone, and underage, and completely naïve to the ways of the world.  
  
Dean stands there for a moment, frozen, before he hastily tucks Sam's wallet into his pocket alongside his own, laces up his boots and stumbles out into the sunshine.  
  
The only person in the stop that's seen Sam is a tired-eyed waitress, who points up the street and says, “Tall kid, right? Headed that way not half an hour ago.”  
  
And Dean feels like he could kiss her, but it would take too much time away from him, so he just bolts out the door and starts running. 

 

  
Sam stands outside the station for a whole minute before he walks inside; the air conditioning is a blessing from the gods compared to the heat that is Albuquerque in the summer. The woman at the high counter looks at him expectantly, and he reaches automatically into his pocket for his wallet.  
  
And finds it missing.  
  
He swears and dodges back outside with the woman's disapproving look. 

 

  
Dean doesn't even stop to catch his breath, too desperate that he'll be too late, that Sam has somehow found money or earned it somehow (the thought makes him sick) and bought a ticket, and that a bus has taken him away and Dean will never find him.  
  
But as he gets closer, he sees Sam's shape huddled in front of the station, looking pissed and hot and sweaty, and Dean wants nothing more than to hug him (no matter how fucking girly it is, Christ this kid is going to kill him). He doesn't, but it's a close thing.  
  
He doesn't stop running until he's standing right in front of Sam, and then he doubles over with it. Dean keeps himself pretty fit, hates to fit the stereotype, but running in the breath-stealing heat is something different entirely. He endures the weight of Sam's eyes, the uncertain glare that fades the more Dean doesn't speak.  
  
When he's caught his breath, he says, “Wait,” like that isn't what Sam's been doing, and leans against the building. “You... Sam. Why would you ever think that I...?”  
  
Sam's eyes narrow, defensive, and Dean dares himself to hope just a bit. “Why else? Nothing is free, Dean. Nobody does so many generous things without wanting something in return.”  
  
“Gordon tell you that?” Dean asks, and snorts. “Hate to tell you, kid, but Gordon is seriously screwed in the head. He'll be worse by the time I'm done with him.”  
  
He pauses for a moment, looks directly at Sam and says, “I don't know what I did to convince you that that's what I wanted. I'm not entirely sure what made you think _Gordon_ had it right, of all people, but I...” Dean clears his throat. “I couldn't do that to you. To anybody, but you least of all.”  
  
Sam looks like he doesn't know what to say, and Dean doesn't know whether to read that as a good thing or not. It takes a moment of Sam opening and closing his mouth, preparing to speak, before he gets the words out.  
  
“I'm not gay,” is the first thing he says, and it sounds compulsive. “I can't be.”  
  
There's enough self-loathing behind those words to make Dean empathize on instinct. He's not even sure if it's the right thing to say, if it's going to make Sam hate him more or less, if anything he could think to say will make a difference when Sam is... Sam, and he seems so small in comparison. “There's nothing wrong with it.”  
  
The look Sam throws him pierces right through. “There is. You don't...” His sigh is heavy. “You know what? I don't think I actually believed that you would want that from me. I think I wanted to believe it because it was easier than admitting to myself that I'm just as fucked as dad always said.”  
  
At this, Sam sits on the filthy concrete, like standing with the weight on his shoulders is too much. He looks up at Dean, expecting, and Dean complies, watching Sam with wary eyes. It's only when Dean's seated, knees nearly brushing Sam's and only not quite because he's still afraid Sam will bolt, that he asks, “What?”  
  
As soon as he asks, he realizes he already knows the answer.  
  
He doesn't even give Sam a chance to answer before he says, “That's why you're here? Because your dad didn't like that you were...?”  
  
Sam shakes his head, looking morose, and if it was socially acceptable to assume a fetal position when over 6 feet tall and male, Dean has a feeling Sam would be doing it right now. “Not exactly. I had a... I had this friend. He was gay. Not with me,” Sam laughs, nervously, “but still. Small towns, you know?”  
  
Dean wishes he didn't know where this was going.  
  
“They, uh. They caught him out, one night. And he wasn't do anything, he was just walking, and. By the time they got him to the hospital, he'd lost too much blood.” Sam takes a breath, clears his throat and doesn't know what to do with his hands. “Dad thought that the same'd happen to me. He thought – well, he was a Marine, and you know how that goes, right?”  
  
Again, Dean wishes he didn't. He's momentarily grateful that the only thing his dad was strict about was making runs on time, keeping the trucks running in perfect condition and not putting much store by material things. Dean'd only had a leaning in that direction a couple of times, but his dad didn't much care who he fucked as long as it kept his mind clear to get his job done.  
  
Sam's voice pulls Dean out of his thoughts. “And I tried to tell him that it wasn't a bad thing, that it only mattered to close-minded assholes, and he took that to mean that I was... like that. He said I could be a fag if I wanted, but I wasn't going to do it under his roof. I don't know if it was because I'd considered it or because I was so mad at him, but... I left.”  
  
Dean looks down at his hands, because he knows that if he looks at Sam now he'll want to kiss him, and that's sort of detrimental to their cause, here. “So, your aunt in Palo Alto...?”  
  
“Doesn't exist.”  
  
“Ah .”  
  
Silence for a while, and they don't look at each other.  
  
“I wasn't supposed to like it,” Sam says, quiet, and Dean startles at the suddenness of it. And under normal circumstances, he'd be making cracks about how he's just that good, that no one could resist. It's a testament to how much Sam suddenly means to him that he doesn't.  
  
“But you did.” It isn't a question because it doesn't have to be. Dean remembers the sounds Sam made, his arousal and the way he bucked and cursed and tightened around Dean.  
  
The noise Sam makes now is supposed to be a laugh, even if it doesn't come out that way. “I did. And I wish... I wish things were different, and that I could, but. I can't.”  
  
Dean looks at him, ducks his head to make Sam meet his eyes. “I don't know if I'm the right person to tell you this, but. You can. You know you can.” Dean stands up, brushes off his jeans. “Now, if you still want to go... wherever, I can get you a ticket. Purely out of generosity,” he adds, not quite smiling to himself. “But if you change your mind? I've been looking for a copilot for a while.”  
  
He lowers his eyes, doesn't watch Sam because all of his bravado suddenly leaves him. “Job's yours if you want it. I won't force you into anything.”  
  
And it's going to kill him, watching Sam every day and not being able to touch now that he can't even illusion himself about what it'd be like. But Sam's friendship is more to him than that, and he can deal with it.  
  
There's another long, uncomfortable pause, and Dean's about to say something overused like “I understand if you don't want to” when Sam stands. He takes a step forward, close enough to touch, and when Dean looks up despite himself, something in Sam's eyes has broken, warmth spilled forth from it, and for about the thousandth time, Dean doesn't trust himself to hope.  
  
“I think I'd like that,” Sam says, breathless, and leans forward the extra inch to kiss Dean. It makes his lip throb, but the elated feeling that's throbbing deeper inside eclipses it.  
  
It feels like hours later when they've pulled away, sweaty and too-hot and both too happy to care. On the way back to the truck, Dean rests a hand on the back of Sam's neck, ignores the way Sam's damp hair curls over his fingers.  
  
“You don't have to worry,” he says, and Sam looks up from the sidewalk to look at him, questioningly. Dean grins at him. “As long as I'm around, nothing bad is gonna happen to you.” 

 

  
_Castiel knows that Uriel had manipulated some aspects of this scenario to make it impossible for it to play out, and now that it's played out anyway, he can hear Uriel's protests long before they start.  
  
"This one can't count," Uriel says. "Sam was a minor, he was... impressionable. He only wanted to be himself, and Dean was the independent adult. Besides, that isn't **love**." He spits the word out like it personally offends him.  
  
"Isn't it?"  
  
"It's... hero worship! No, Castiel, this one can't count."  
  
Castiel makes the sunny sidewalk of Albequerque disappear, replaces it with a palpable, black darkness that begs for creation. "The details are irrelevent. Fashion the next one, if you think the outcome will be any different."  
  
So Uriel does._

 

  
**TBC...**


	6. ~ V. 13% Fear ~

 

  
Flights into a war-torn country aren't easy. Sam doesn't actually know this until they're flying over one in a helicopter that looks like it's a strong gust of wind away from being scrap metal, avoiding being shot at. Despite the fact that he's bagged the interview with the government officials that no one else was gutsy enough to even ask for, the news apparently hasn't filtered down to the field soldiers.  
  
Sam would use the helicopter's announcement system to tell them this, but that didn't work the first five times they were almost shot down. He has a feeling it isn't going to work now, either.  
  
The pilot's pretty well pissed off at this point. He keeps shouting in the native language – which, to Sam, sounds like some sort of estranged mixture of French and tribal Urdu – and Sam can't do anything more than wince and pass him more money.  
  
He's starting to get a pretty good idea why there’s a civil war here in the first place. Sam's just a freelance reporter, trying to help their plight be publicized (at least, that's his angle, anyway; he's really just going to sell it to the highest-bidding political magazine when he's back in the US). The government wouldn't even send someone. The pilot, whose name Sam can't pronounce, was just the nearest local with knowledge on how to fly a helicopter.  
  
But this story is going to make his career, regardless of the lengths he has to take to get it. He and his team of half-crazy photographers are going to be millionaires when this is all over with.  
  
Okay, maybe not millionaires. But they'd be able to live comfortably, and that's really all Sam wants.  
  
Two days into the flight, they finally land at a small, rooftop helipad. The landscape is forested; after flying over so many forests, Sam can't help but think it's a bit too... normal, for a government building. Maybe that's the genius of it.  
  
As soon as the blades stop cutting the air, there are troops on the rooftop; big bronze-skinned men with automatic machines guns strapped to them and enough ammunition for a full-frontal assault. The more he becomes familiar with the country, the more he realizes why no one else had the story. Sam and his photographers step down from the helicopter with their hands in the air, equipment still stuck below the 'copter's seats.  
  
The pilot and the guards (he can't think of anything else to call them) start what amounts to a conversation in a faster, cruder dialect than the one the pilot had been using earlier. Their dialogue is lightning-fast, and in the space of five minutes they are being moved into the building.  
  
Well, 'moved' is a relative term. All of their equipment stays behind and they're encouraged to keep up by the guards' machine guns periodically prodding them. It isn't a very large base by US standards, and Sam has to keep reminding himself to remember the way. Magazines eat up narrative interviews, don't they?  
  
They find themselves being led down into the earth, into a room lined with crude cells with wooden bars and clay walls.  
  
What light there is down here comes from behind them, filters down and dissolves into near-pitch at the back of the room. There's no way to the surface but the long, sloping corridor that led here. No guards are stationed to watch the various prisoners in the cells; Sam can't help but find this odd, until he realizes that there's no need. There's no chance of a prisoner escaping because they'd have to pass the guards at the mouth of the corridor to get out.  
  
It's clever in a primitive way.  
  
The team is herded into a cell near the back of the room, all four of them in one tiny, cramped space. Sam is momentarily grateful that they weren't allowed to bring their equipment; if there was anything else in the cell, there'd be no room to breathe.  
  
The biggest of the guards steps forward and shuts the panel of wooden bars serving as a door. There's a rusted padlock at one of the edges; he loops it through the clay wall and the bar and snicks it into place.  
  
At the sound, scores of hands reach out from between the wooden bars on either side, groping for anything to reach; thin, emaciated arms with skeletal fingers. Voices scrape over syllables that are gibberish to Sam. He's glad it's dark. He doesn't want to see the faces of the prisoners that've been down here for days, weeks. A few of the cells remain quiet and black.  
  
Hopefully, they're empty.  
  
When the guard is out of sight, the hands retreat back into their cells and the yammering stops. Everything falls eerily silent.  
  
“Nice welcome committee,” Ash comments as he lowers himself to the gritty, sandy floor. No one replies, not right away; they're all preoccupied with the same question, though no one wants to vocalize it. Sam keeps himself from worrying by mentally logging every detail, hoping he can remember it all.  
  
When they get out of here – _when_ , not the _if_ it's threatening to become – his hand will cramp with how fast he'll want to get it on paper.  
  
It's impossible to tell what time of day it is, so it's impossible to tell how long they've been there. It could have been hours, minutes, days. They wouldn't know.  
  
There's the snick-slide of something behind him, and when he turns Sam is momentarily blinded by the fire illuminating Ellen's face. “Wish I had a lighter,” she says, shaking the match out as it gets too close to her fingers and lighting another. That one goes out just as quickly, and she stops trying. There's nothing to see down here anyway, though it wouldn't have made them as crazy if they could at least see something.  
  
“You know what I wanna know,” the senior member of their team and lead photographer, Bobby, speaks up from the very back of the cell. “If they treat us this badly, how do those poor rebel bastards get it?”  
  
From some place out in the dark (and maybe to the left, but it's hard to tell), someone laughs. It's a low, wretched sound, and wouldn't be noticeable if it weren't so quiet. Sam strains his eyes, trying to figure the source of the sound. “Much worse,” a voice croaks from the same direction, and it's so unexpected all of them jump in unison.  
  
“You speak English?” Sam asks. It's not a very reporter-like question to start off with, but he's relatively surprised that somebody here can understand them.  
  
“Native.”  
  
Sam guesses that the guy's in the next cell over, though he isn't sure. “Are you a reporter?” If he is, that explains why no one's got the story. The government doesn't allow anyone to get the story.  
  
The feeling of dread is already rising when the guy says, “No. But if that's what you guys are, I don't envy you.” He sounds like he hasn't had water in days. Sam's sympathy is quickly swallowed by the fear that sparks his overactive imagination. He has a sick feeling they're going to be down here until they're dead, starved and dehydrated, as emaciated and skeletal as the others.  
  
“What do you mean?”  
  
The prisoner laughs, and it quickly degenerates into a dry cough. Sam waits, anxious, hands curled around the wood of the bars like he can see who he's talking to if he cranes his head enough. He can feel the splinters digging into his palms, but it's a minor annoyance compared to everything else.  
  
“I mean,” the guy continues when he can breathe again, albeit unsteadily. “They're going to give you the story. And then they're going to kill you, one way or another.”  
  
“You're a rebel prisoner, aren't you?” Sam asks, realization dawning.  
  
The guy snorts derisively. “Guess that's all I am now, yeah.”  
  
“What--” he starts, but Ellen shushes him. Footsteps echo down the corridor, resounding in the room like gunshots, and a group of guards appears at the entrance. One of them starts toward their cell, ring of keys rattling as he steps, and the sea of hands reaches out again, brushing his uniform and groping for freedom. The guard issues a singular, nonsensical command and they slink back into their cells and fall silent again.  
  
He unlocks the padlock holding their cell shut and opens the door, ushers them out. The rest of the guards swarm them as soon as they get past the corridor, and into the bright light of dusk filtering through windows in the main building.  
  
More twisting corridors and they're led into a room that's considerably more decorated than what they've seen of the rest of the place and so much larger than the cell they'd been in.  
  
They're left alone in this room, and immediately spread out.  
  
“The next time you have a crazy-ass plan, remind me to stay home,” Ash says.  
  
Minutes later, the door bursts open and an important-looking man steps into what Sam assumes is the parlor, or some sort of office. He's flanked by guards toting more heavy artillery. It does what it's supposed to, serves as a reminder to any of them if they feel like stepping out of line.  
  
“You requested an interview,” the man says. His English is fairly good but his accent is thick enough that it takes a few seconds to work out what he's saying. There's a moment when Sam isn't sure if he's the one that needs to answer, and then he realizes that everyone's looking at him. He clears his throat.  
  
“Yeah, I.” He's struck with sudden inspiration, and wonders if it's too much to ask, decides to ask anyway. “But I was wondering if I could get one with the rebel prisoner you've captured as well. Just to get the full scope, you know.”  
  
The man's laugh isn't kind. “You Americans like to press your luck.” He spits out 'Americans' like the word personally offends him. “I shouldn't let you.”  
  
Sam's stupid, stupid pride rises to the challenge. “I'll pay you well for your help. I don't know what you did with my pilot, but you can ask him; I'll even make the government out to be the good guy. I just want a good story out of it.” There's something liberating in the knowledge that once he gets out of the country, he can write it however he wants and they won't be able to do a damn thing about it.  
  
Another yammering conversation takes place between the man and his guard, and the guard disappears back into the hallway. The man surveys the four of them, measuring just how much of a threat they could be.  
  
“I'll give you your interview, but you must leave immediately afterwards.”  
  
“Definitely not going to be a problem,” Bobby says under his breath, from somewhere behind Sam. He resists the urge to laugh. Not only would it be insulting, there's absolutely nothing about this situation that's funny in anything but a hysterical way.  
  
“Can we have our equipment?” Ellen asks.  
  
The man waves his hand and makes a frustrated sound. “Of course. This man will take one of you to get what you need.” One of the other guards steps forward, and Sam doesn't turn, but he can almost feel the way the rest of the team is deciding who's going to go. Ash ends up going, and the way he eyes the guard's gun makes Sam wish his ambitions were more benign. 

 

  
Minutes later, the door creaks open. Sam expects it to be Ash returning with the equipment, but it isn't; the guards are leading the prisoner in.  
  
They don't have to drag him - he's barely struggling. It might have something to do with the way his skin is pale, almost waxy from spending so long down in that cell. The sun is still setting through the large window behind Sam; the light's spilling in, bright, and the prisoner has his eyes shut tight when he enters, eyebrows knitted together like he's in pain.  
  
Ellen shuts the window when she realizes, which is just a second quicker than Sam; she's pulling the stubborn, foreign blinds over it before Sam has a chance to stand and do the same. They put the prisoner in the chair opposite the couch where Sam is sitting.  
  
He takes a minute to prepare his questions, trying to make them sound innocent enough if any of the guards know English or if their boss is listening from another room. The guards step back; the prisoner's wrists are still bound behind him, and they obviously don't consider him much of a threat.  
  
Sam wants to wait for Ash to get back with the equipment, really he does, but there's no telling how long it's going to be and they might be giving him only a small amount of time with the prisoner. He's pretty sure he can remember the interview without any help, doesn't know if he'll ever be able to forget it, any of it.  
  
He looks up, opens his mouth to introduce himself and ask the first question, but he stops and ends up sitting there with his mouth hanging open. It's not a good first-impression, he realizes dimly, but he can't help it.  
  
Darkness has fallen in the room, dark enough that the prisoner can open his eyes. And even through the dark, he has to have the most beautiful eyes Sam's ever seen. They're huge, made more so by the way the guy's face is wan, unhealthy-looking. Now that he sees the whole picture he can imagine what that face might look like when it's healthy, and it makes him forget every question he'd had lined up to ask.  
  
Sam stares for a solid minute, and the prisoner meets his gaze, unwavering. Now he can see something the guards have neglected: they might think they've crushed the man's spirit but there's still fire in there somewhere, waiting for just enough gunpowder or lighter fluid to blaze, consume.  
  
Bobby says, “Boy...” behind him, warning him, and when Sam looks away from the prisoner he can see the guards glaring. He's wasting time.  
  
So he clears his throat, doesn't know where to rest his eyes as he asks the first question. “What's your name, and what was your position in this conflict before you were captured?”  
  
The prisoner makes a move like he's going to lean forward, like it's second-nature, but without the use of his hands the movement is awkward, aborted. He rests against the back of the chair again, and clears his throat.  
  
“Name's Dean. Came here a couple years ago on vacation. You know, when it was actually a nice place to visit? Never left. I figured I could help the cause. Turned out I was pretty good at it, so they made me their leader.” Dean's voice is raspy, dry. Sam doesn't know if calling for water would be pressing his luck further, so he casts his eyes downward and pretends not to notice.  
  
“How did you get to be the leader of the rebel force?”  
  
“They didn't trust me at first, thought I might be some kinda of spy; after the first few runs they took me on, they started looking at me different.” Dean clears his throat again, and Sam wonders how long he's been down in there, how long it's been since he spoke to another human being, another American.  
  
He continues after a brief silence, and his voice is weaker. “There was this... I don't know, skirmish, where the government found our base, opened fire. I took a bullet for their leader and it put me down for a few weeks.  
  
“That helped, I guess. Next thing I know, the leader gets himself killed on a raid and I can hardly walk, but everyone's looking for me to tell them what to do.”  
  
Sam knows he'll remember this. There's no need to have a camera except that he'll want to have pictures of it later, something to remember Dean by other than his story. Even if it is pretty poignant. “Wow,” he says, when Dean falls silent. There are so many things he wants to ask that he abandons the premise of an interview and goes for a conversation, because he can always polish it up later. “I guess you're familiar with what's going on, then. When did... when did it start, and why is it happening?”  
  
Dean snorts, makes the same move to lean forward as before, and Sam would call for him to be unbound if he didn't already feel the eyes of the guards on him, waiting with their guns ready for him to step out of line. “Same as any civil war gets started. The government oppresses a group of people that they don't agree with, and the people rebel. I'm surprised at you.”  
  
The last bit catches Sam off-guard. “Huh?”  
  
“I remember watching 60 Minutes back home. I know the type you're trying to be, all professional and poignant without really caring. Selling articles and ratings are what it's about, right? But you're not like them. You're different.”  
  
This isn't the place Sam hoped to find introspection. He doesn't want to be judged or measured, he wants to get his job done. Only now it's become more than that, because Dean is right. Everyone he's ever watched, every journalist or reporter he's ever worked with or observed, is detached from their work.  
  
And he isn't. He's known it for a while, but Dean saying it out loud almost makes him realize.  
  
Almost.  
  
This isn't about the story anymore. It's not just that there's a personal challenge to make it something more, issued from the man sitting across from him with his crystal, tragic green eyes – it's something he has to do, now.  
  
What he can do about it, though, is still pretty vague.  
  
“What's going to happen to you?” Sam asks, quiet, and around them the air is static.  
  
Dean shrugs with one shoulder. “There's an old-fashioned guillotine down in the courtyard that's got my name on it. This time tomorrow, it really won't matter what I told some reporter. I won't be around to see the consequences.”  
  
Nothing Dean's told him so far has made Sam physically ache, but that does. It's wrong. Not just war in general, because he's known that for a long time, but... the people that get caught up in war, the victims of it, should never have to go through the hardships they do. The people of this country should be living in peace, and Dean should be working a regular job back home, watching games on Sundays and grilling steaks in the backyard.  
  
Sam's never had that life, but he doesn't really want it anymore. It's unfair for him to have it when there are people like Dean, caught up in something that they had nothing to do with and dying, slow from dehydration or quickly from the downward cut of a shining guillotine blade.  
  
When he goes back to write his story, this is when he'll decide that he knows what he has to do.  
  
It's not a big step, nothing that's really going to help anyone but Dean, but it's something. And it's the least Sam can do for a fellow American.  
  
Dean watches him oddly, waiting for a reaction, and Sam wonders if everything he thinks is written all over his face.  
  
“Do you think your rebels will come and rescue you?”  
  
It's a cautious question, and by the look in Dean's eyes, he's caught on.  
  
“I don't think so,” he says. “Last place they had camp, far as I know, was a ways up the river. They could always appoint another leader. There's this woman, Pamela. Another American; I'm not quite sure how she got here, but she's sort of second in command, you know? They'll probably just look to her.”  
  
“Ah, I see. They're going to execute you at sundown?”  
  
“Yeah. Pretty classic.”  
  
Sam nods, looks over his shoulder at Ellen and Bobby. They don't have to help, not if they don't want to risk their lives. Sam would understand. He just needs to do this; it feels like it could be the most important thing he's ever done.  
  
“How--” But he's cut off by the guards' yammering, yelling at him, and he reflexively leans as far away as he can. They each grab one of Dean's arms and haul him up, and again Dean doesn't struggle, resigns himself to it. He watches Sam the whole way out, though, and the haunted look in his eyes is as close as Sam thinks he'll get to hopeful.

 

  
It isn't long after that they're being rushed back out to their helicopter. Their pilot is there, looking pale and shaken, and Sam really can't blame him. When they climb up into the 'copter, they expect to find Ash, or at least to find the equipment gone, but it hasn't been touched and the fourth member of their team is nowhere to be found.  
  
“Ash?” Sam calls, like he expects him to jump out from behind the helicopter or something. The pilot makes a quick, jerky movement with his head, back and forth. Sam calls louder, and the pilot lets out a little squeak and shakes his head more, gripping the controls with white knuckles.  
  
Sam rounds on the guards, angry and afraid, but they've apparently gone past being friendly. Every single one of their machine guns is pointed at what remains of his crew and the pilot, backing them up with slow, measured steps against the 'copter.  
  
“Let it be a warning to you,” the tallest guard says, and sick dread rushes through Sam. He didn't know they spoke English, wasn't aware that everything he said to Dean could easily have been reported back to their boss. “Now get in and go away.”  
  
By the time he's finished saying this, the machine gun is pressed right against his chest, and Sam knows that if the guard were to open fire now there'd be nothing left of him to send home.  
  
He takes a deep, steadying breath and tries to push his anger away, make himself less likely to resort to violence, because there's no way he's going to take on a guy with a machine gun and live, no matter how much he wants it.  
  
“Shit,” he says, less of an expletive and more like a sigh. He turns, slow, and climbs into the 'copter, nods at Ellen and Bobby to do the same. The guards continue to look menacing, continue to wave their guns at them, and Sam knows they aren't getting Ash back.  
  
Damnit, this was his idea. This was all his idea and Ash hadn't wanted any part of it, and now he was going to die because of it. If he wasn't already dead. As they take flight, he aims a kick at the shoddy metal of the inside of the door, hears the less-than-satisfying clinging reverberate over the metal body.  
  
This certainly puts a dent in his plans. He wasn't expecting to lose anybody, not here, not now. He wasn't aware if Ash had any family, but when he got back to the States, he was going to find them. He was going to find them and go to their doors, tell them his name and that he'd gotten Ash killed.  
  
Because he had to. And if he can't execute his first plan, well, Sam thinks that's the next best thing.  
  
“Hell,” Ellen says, when they start off in the direction they came. He can hear the tears in her voice, knows that she doesn't want anybody to know. Sam takes a deep breath, rests his head back against the seat and takes a deep breath that comes out shaky.  
  
_Fuck._

 

  
Night comes swiftly; the 'copter is following the river, and Sam can tell the pilot wants to land for a break, but he doesn't trust it. The country here is too wild, and if the wildlife didn't kill you, he's more than sure the natives will. He's running Ash's lanyard through his fingers, pulling the cord taught and then dropping it to start over, trying not to look at the photo on the front of the plastic card hanging from it.  
  
Nobody's said more than a handful of words since they left the headquarters, and when Sam turns to look at his two remaining photographers, they avert their eyes. He takes to watching the landscape falling away under the helicopter.  
  
The river is inky-black with just the stars reflecting off it. It's so black that when light starts to grow some ways ahead, Sam sits up in his seat and fixes his eyes on it, waiting. When they get closer, he notices it's a large, sprawling camp; there are small fires lit between tents, camouflaged vehicles waiting around at random and a large, hulking helicopter behind the tents.  
  
It isn't exactly subtle. But he wonders, thinks about Dean locked away in his cell, awaiting tomorrow's sunset because at least he has something to look forward to when they kill him, about the difference he could make right here, right now.  
  
“Land over there,” Sam instructs, pointing to a point far enough way that they won't be seen as a threat (unless he's wrong, in which case they're all pretty much fucked; why doesn't he just stop having ideas, already? It's not like they ever work, and then people get hurt). The pilot eyes him, wary, before he does as instructed.  
  
“Not good,” he says, and Sam would have to agree, but he wasn't going to voice it.  
  
As soon as they touch down, there are people surrounding the 'copter. They aren't uniformed like the guards at the HQ; they're each dressed differently, still toting guns but at least they aren't aiming them at Sam and his crew. That's always a plus.  
  
“I'll get out,” he says, unnecessarily.  
  
As soon as his feet hit the dirt, he's surrounded. “Wait,” he says, hopes they listen. “I, uh. I met with your leader. At the government headquarters? I'm a reporter,” he says by way of explanation. The people surrounding him exchange looks, seem to have an entire conversation with their eyes, and Sam makes a resolution: when and if he gets out of this, he's going to stop having guns pointed at him. 

 

  
The second in command, Pamela, speaks both the native language and English. She's anxious to meet him, a little cold at first (because she has to be, Sam understands; he's just had a very long day and stopped caring a while ago). But she's entirely too trusting. Maybe it's because he's a Yank as well, maybe it's the look in his eyes. Either way, she listens to him speak, listens to the story of his brief time in the government headquarters and his meeting with Dean.  
  
When he gets to the part about Ash, he has to take a deep breath to continue.  
  
Another, less elaborate plan is forming in the back of his mind. And he's going to go through with it as long as he can.  
  
He tells her his plans eventually, and she outright refuses.  
  
“Sam, we can't do that. We can't raid the government base. Now, Dean's a good leader, and I understand why you'd want to rescue him, but it's... it's too risky. He wouldn't want us to do that for him.”  
  
“Really? He told me where you guys were when I mentioned it, when I asked if he thought anyone would come save him.” Sam watches for her reaction, gauges it and wonders how far he can get with it. “We have to do this, Pamela. _I_ have to do this. So you can either lend me a machine gun and let me do it myself, or you can help me and maybe we'll have a chance.”  
  
She looks out over the camp, at the people wandering between camps, and sighs. “It's a suicide mission. You know that, right?”  
  
“No,” Sam says, trying to sound as convinced as he should. “No, I don't know that.”  
  
“Fine,” Pamela sighs, bowing her head. “But for one man? If we make it out of this, Dean is probably going to kill us himself.” 

 

  
In the end, they're able to assemble forty men willing to come with them. Pamela gives them no illusions about what their mission is, or what might happen. She's brash and honest with them, and Sam finds himself thinking about what kind of leader she'd make. He feels Ash's ID in his pocket, thinks back to where his passport and other relevant papers are stashed.  
  
He'll need them.  
  
Pamela sends Ellen and Bobby away in the nice helicopter and they spend the rest of the night taking small loads of soldiers as close to the government base as they can without being seen. They'll trek the rest of the way in the morning, make their way through the ring of sentinels that's no doubt set up in the woods around where they need to be, and hopefully make it to the actual base around the same time as Dean is being brought to the guillotine.  
  
It's a risky plan; too much could go wrong, too much is resting on this, and Sam doesn't think for one minute that it won't be worth it. He's been outfitted with a gun of his own, even if he barely knows how to use it. It'll help him look intimidating if nothing else.  
  
The forty men take ten-man shifts watching and sleeping in turn. By the time the sun comes up, Sam's buzzing with a different kind of nervous energy, something he's never felt before. Of course, he's never led a heroic, suicidal mission, either. It's kind of intoxicating.  
  
Not that he's ever trying it again after today, that is. 

 

  
Midday sees them inching silently toward the base. They've come across a few sentinels already, and taken all of them down; hopefully, no one will know they're coming.  
  
The sun sinking towards the western horizon keeps the time, and each time he looks at it Sam panics a little more. But there's no need to actually worry; by the time the sky starts changing color, they're close enough to the walls that they can see the soft, sandstone color through the trees.  
  
And this is where it gets interesting.  
  
Sam isn't exactly sure where the Courtyard is. He doesn't even have a vague idea. If he were to make an educated guess, he'd say it was in the middle of the complex, which means they're going to have to fight their way in. And by the time they get there, fresh troops are going to be coming from everywhere.  
  
And there are only forty of them, forty-two if he counts Pamela and himself.  
  
He's starting to believe her about the whole suicide mission thing.  
  
“When should we--” he starts to ask, but before he's halfway done with the sentence, Pamela whispers, “Now!” and they're moving, as one, toward the nearest entrance.  
  
A few of them take a window out and go into the first floor that way. The rest search for other windows, or other entrances, because putting all of them through one window would take too long, raise alarm. There's a guard walking the rooftop, and Pamela shoots him down without so much as a second thought. The only sound he makes as his body hits the ground is a sickening thud, and then they're moving on. 

 

  
Things continue in a similar fashion until they finally find the courtyard, and for half a second Sam worries that they're too late. They've been silent, stealthy, and their entire force is stationed at different points along the outer wall of the courtyard. There's a mass of guards in the middle, the important-looking man that Sam assumes is the boss, and Dean in the direct center, already locked into the guillotine.  
  
It isn't a comforting sight. Sam's already had to stop himself from throwing up several times as they made their way to this point, stepping over mutilated bodies with fresh, gushing blood. It's not something he usually sees.  
  
But Dean looks up like he knows they're there, bends his neck back as far as the thick wooden casing will allow. He looks directly at Sam, green eyes reflecting the bright light in the courtyard until they sparkle with it, and the fire Sam remembers seeing there has returned, full-force.  
  
Sam smiles despite himself. It's a really messed-up thing to do.  
  
Pamela leans over, suddenly, whispering in his ear, “You get him out of that, okay? We'll distract them. Just don't get shot,” she says, like a command, and Sam kind of wishes that not getting shot in a field of crossfire was as easy as just willing it not to happen. He knows that isn't the case.  
  
She gives the signal, and the silent courtyard explodes in a hail of machine gun fire.  
  
The guards aren't surprised at all. They react with a detached coldness, shooting at every available hiding place; a bullet whizzes past Sam's ear, and he flinches away from it. It's about to get worse.  
  
“Now they know we're here,” Pamela shouts over the sound of fire, “We'll move forward, you get in there.”  
  
And then she's gone, springing up from her hiding place, and all of the men she's brought with her follow suit. Sam waits a moment, waits until they're midfield, almost close enough to engage the guards in hand-to-hand, before he rushes out around them.  
  
One of the guards shoots at him; he can feel the bullets whizzing past him. Something impacts his shoulder, hard, but he disregards it and keeps moving, ceaseless, to the center of the Courtyard where Dean awaits. He doesn't know how he's going to get the thing open, doesn't know anything except the pinging of bullets hitting metal, hitting dirt, the thud when they embed themselves into a nearby person.  
  
The adrenaline rushes in his ears, and he doesn't have time to think about how horrible this idea was.  
  
Because he's suddenly there, suddenly looming next to the guillotine and he doesn't know what to do with the large, heavy lock.  
  
“You came for me,” Dean shouts over the noise, but it doesn't look like he's grateful. It looks like he's in pain, like every bullet that flies around them is hitting him instead, and Sam takes the lock in his hands, frantically turning it over and over and ducking to avoid shrapnel and flying bullets and god, what has he gotten himself into.  
  
“Yeah, yeah, Dean. I did. God, how do you get this thing...” And then he remembers that he has a machine gun strapped to him, and a smaller gun tucked away, hidden. He goes for the smaller one, tests the weight of it in his hand. He's never shot one before, never even aimed and he's so, so scared he's going to hit Dean that it's making his hands shake.  
  
“Both eyes open, watch for the kick,” Dean tells him, and Sam nods, keeps both eyes open as he points at the heavy lock, hopes the gun works on it, hopes he isn't too late and that no one's dead and that they can all get away.  
  
When he squeezes the trigger, it goes wide, ricochets back somewhere into the crowd, and Sam curses. Dean winces, “Come on, Geraldo. Steady.”  
  
Sam feels something clip the side of his leg, and he drops the gun, reaches down to cradle the wound automatically. In doing so, he misses another, more fatal shot, and for a second he can't breathe. His heart is pounding too hard, there's too much adrenaline and he can't handle it. He knows he's not good in crisis situations but he tries, he fucking tries as hard as he can, and when his fingers close around the gun's handle he's shaking, can't stop himself.  
  
“Hey,” Dean shouts at him, and Sam glances up at him and then over to the lock. He's going to do this. If this is the last thing he does, he's going to get them both out of this alive.  
  
He curses as he squeezes the trigger this time, and he doesn't expect it to work, but when he limps his way over to the guillotine he sees there's a gaping hole where the mechanism used to be. He pulls at it and it separates.  
  
Scarcely believing his luck, he pushes the heavy wood up out of the way. Dean crumples to the ground and Sam rushes to help him; they stand in the field of crossfire, daring fate for a single moment before they start running.  
  
Pamela shouts at them to go, but she doesn't have to tell either of them twice. Dean is weak from starvation and dehydration, and he's worryingly light and thin under his rebel clothes. Sam's leg hurts like crazy, bleeding every time he puts weight on it, but he doesn't think it's the femoral artery. He hopes it isn't, because that would be kind of melodramatic.  
  
They reach the edge of the courtyard and Sam pushes Dean up and over the wall, hopes he can catch himself on the other side. It's a chore climbing up with his leg hurting like it is, but he manages, and barely misses landing on Dean when he reaches the other side.  
  
“Damnit,” Dean says, momentarily removed from the gunfire cacophony behind him. “Why the fuck would you--”  
  
“No time,” Sam cuts him off, wincing as he stands. “We've got to get away before someone realizes you're gone.” He helps Dean to his feet and they set off through the corridors, and Sam takes the nearest window out with a bullet. When it shatters he removes all the glass from the frame and pushes Dean over before himself.  
  
They're halfway to the treeline, halfway to freedom so potent Sam can taste it, when there's a single gunshot, loud even after the Courtyard. Sam feels Dean stiffen next to him, feels him go limp, and Sam casts one single, terrified glance over his shoulder.  
  
It's the man he thinks is the boss. He's standing in the window they've just crawled out of, still aiming a handgun at them. The look in his eyes is manic, blazing hatred, but that's all Sam can register before he has to drag Dean farther away, out of range.  
  
When he looks over, blood is bubbling up between Dean's lips and his face is paler than before. His eyes are glassy, looking beyond the trees to something else, something that Sam can't see. Panic hits him, swift and painful as another gunshot and he doesn't stop, doesn't slow down until they're behind a tree and he can prop Dean up against it to look.  
  
The round hit him straight through the chest; there's an exit wound in the exact center of his body, blood gushing from it in weak, strangled pulses.  
  
“No,” Sam says when he sees it. “No, you can't. Damnit, we were almost...” Something seizes around his lungs, constricts his breathing and he knows he should go, move before they come after him, but the feeling gripping him, around him, through him, is almost like dying. He wouldn't care so much just then if an entire group of those guards took turns shooting him, wouldn't care if he himself was dying because this? This isn't fair. This isn't the way life's supposed to be, damnit.  
  
But Dean's breathing, even if it's shallow and not at all convincing. “Hey,” he says, and there's blood thick in his voice, quiet and pained. “Hey, it's... you've got to go.”  
  
Sam shakes his head. “No. No, I'm not going to leave you. We can--”  
  
“We can't. I'm... it'll be okay, but I'm not going to be able to run. You've-” Dean takes a shaky breath. “Pamela will find me. But you, you've got to run. Please.”  
  
“I was supposed to save you,” Sam answers, like that explains everything, and maybe it does. Dean smiles at him, as widely as he can manage.  
  
“You did.”  
  
In the end, Sam runs. He doesn't want to, but Dean says that this isn't his fight and that he's done fine, but he has to go before he ends up in the same position.  
  
It's something he'll regret until he dies.

 

  
_Three Months Later_

  
Sam clutches the letter in his hand. It's the fifth he's received from TIME magazine, offering him more money than he's even seen for the manuscript sitting on his desk. He's torn, because Dean's story, Ash's story, needs to be told. They deserve it.  
  
But he doesn't want to sell it. It's too intimate; it seems like something he and Dean should share, between the two of them, forever. It seems cheap to sell it, even when he needs the money in a bad way.  
  
He's gone around and around with this debate for weeks, but the manuscript remains on his desk, and there's something that's still missing inside of Sam. He needs to know if Dean made it, if Pamela made it. Hell, he hasn't even heard from Ellen or Bobby since he got back to the States.  
  
Sam is completely alone, and he probably deserves it. He climbs the stairs to his crappy apartment, puts his key in the lock and jiggles it around until it pops open. One day, he's going to afford new locks. One day, he's going to find another primary source of income, one that isn't his most precious secret revealed to the world.  
  
He shuts the door behind him, throws his bag into the kitchen chair just inside the door and sits in the other, resting his head in his hands and staring down at the new envelope.  
  
_Shit._  
  
There's a knock on the door, sudden. Sam frowns, because he doesn't know anybody, doesn't have any friends and doesn't think anyone actually knows where he lives. Maybe it's the landlady. He heaves himself up and limps the few feet to the door; his leg still gives him pains on rainy days like today.  
  
There isn't a peephole on his door, so he has to go on instinct. It's not like there's anyone in Los Angeles that could actually scare him, not after what he'd seen when he was overseas. But it was the principle of the thing.  
  
He cracked the door open, and was met with an unfamiliar face. Pretty eyes, though.  
  
It hits him like a punch to the gut, but he's pretty sure he's hallucinating, so he waits for the guy on the other side of the threshold to speak.  
  
“Um. Geraldo?” He offers, and it's like someone's taken the rug from under Sam's feet. He grips the door with both hands just to stay upright.  
  
“Dean,” he breathes.  
  
“Never caught your name, though. Kind of makes it hard to find you.”  
  
And then they're laughing. They're laughing until it's physically impossible for them to laugh anymore, until Sam doesn't know what to say because he feels lighter than he has in a long time, feels healthy for the first time in three months.  
  
“Sam,” he says when he can breathe again. “I'm... you look...”  
  
_Healthy_ , he wants to say. _Mentally stable_.  
  
“Not a complete recovery yet, but I've got more of a chance here than there. Can I come in...?”  
  
“Yeah, uh. Yeah.” Sam steps back from the door, lets Dean in.  
  
When he sleeps after that, he doesn't dream about it. He doesn't worry about it, and everything falls into place. Dean doesn't leave him, and Sam wakes up one morning to find himself saved.

 

  
_Uriel glares over at his superior. “I don't understand how you keep influencing these!”  
  
“Again, I have absolutely nothing to do with it.” Despite Uriel's accusations, Castiel is pleased. It isn't pride that he feels every time one of their scenarios plays out for the better, because that would be sinful. It's closer to happiness. His Father's plan is coming together, and everything is set as it should be.  
  
“It's improbable.”  
  
“It was your creation. Perhaps you should have made it more plausible.”  
  
Uriel seethes, and Castiel sets yet another stage._

 

  
**TBC...**


	7. ~ VI. 20% Pain ~

 

  
Creedmoor Regional Medical Center's monitoring ward is sectioned off from the rest of the hospital, settled in a small building that's only attached by a long, pristine hallway. Most of the patients are either comatose or so unable to function that there's hardly any trouble; most of the nurses say that their jobs are boring and routine, and they'd give anything to work up at the main hospital. Here they hardly feel like they're making a difference. Most of the patients don't make it out anyway, and the almost certain death sentence makes for a bleak atmosphere.   
  
Sam is glad he doesn't work there. His routine visits to the cardiac patients that stayed for constant observation are depressing enough; there are only four or five of them, but it's the worst part of his day. Or it had been, once upon a time.   
  
A few days ago, they'd brought Dean Winchester in. He's a heart patient in need of a transplant, waiting for his name to come up on the National Donor List. Meanwhile, he has to be under constant observation lest his own heart completely give out on him. It'd speed the process along, because emergencies tend to prompt the paperwork to move faster. But Sam didn't realize he even needed the transplant until he looked at his chart; from the way he talks, flirts shamelessly, taunts death... Sam hadn't guessed he was a cardiac patient at all.   
  
The discovery of something so rare in so desolate a place made Sam rethink his visits to the monitoring ward. They weren't _so_ horrible. He'd actually started looking forward to them, which was honestly something he never thought he'd consider.  
  
He feels a little guilty for glossing over the other patients in the ward with only the minimal level of care - usually he was very thorough, and if he didn't maintain his commitment to delivering that the head of the cardiac unit would be on his ass. For the past week or so, the only chart that's been even near as detailed as his usual work was Dean's, and Sam only hopes no one notices.  
  
The nurses greet him as usual when he arrives that day, give him their daily reports and send him on his rounds. The first four patients never change, their condition remains constant; it's unpleasant to see the lack of progress, but they'd tried every treatment the hospital offered and still nothing. So it's this, until something changed for better or worse.   
  
Sam drops their charts off at the nurse's station and heads to Dean's room on the far end of the ward. He knocks, standard procedure, and lets himself in.  
  
Dean's face lights up when he sees Sam walk in the room.  
  
"Hello, gorgeous," he greets, beaming at him.  
  
His skin is so pale it's almost impossible to distinguish where he ends and the pristine sheets began; his green eyes look even bigger surrounded by deep purple circles, but the crinkles on the corners show he 's good, considering.  
  
"You see, Jo, he's the man I've been telling you about," he explains to the small blonde nurse who's taking his blood. "He's the cruel owner of my heart."  
  
Nurse Jo hides a giggle behind a hand, as Dean turns toward Sam and looks at him adoringly. "When will you put me out of my misery and accept to be my lawfully wedded wife, doctor W?" he asked for the umpteenth time.  
  
Sam chuckles and pulls the door closed behind him so the rest of the ward won't be bothered. “I don't know whether to be more disturbed by you calling me cruel or implying that I'd be the girl.” And he's glad for the low light, because there's no way his cheeks aren't heating. Jo fits the vials of Dean's blood onto her tray and leaves the room, mumbling some sort of promise to be back to check on him later; Sam doesn't hear her, too busy browsing the daily report the nurses have assembled for him and notating the information onto the chart that goes back to the cardiac unit. He checks his watch, writes down the time and then the important information from the beeping machine at Dean's bedside.   
  
As soon as Jo leaves, Dean sits straighter in the bed and starts pulling invisible threads from his shirt. “You are cruel,” he retorts, without looking at Sam. “You keep my hanging. I don't even know if you could ever be – interested or if – you know.” Then he snorts.  
  
"And by the way? You would totally be the girl. You'd rock that white dress, honey," he adds, eyes sparkling with mischief.  
  
Sam snorts. "Yeah, okay, if that helps you sleep." He moves around the bed, checking the railings even though the nurses should already be doing that (being thorough). He cuts off the beginnings of Dean's retort (if there is one; Sam's trying to pretend he isn't paying attention to the way his eyes sparkle), "How do you feel today?"  
  
Dean grabs his doctor's wrist, trying not to concentrate on the contrast between Sam's bronzed skin and his, which is so transparent his veins are showing. He chooses to smile softly at Sam, instead, his eyes going softer. "Much better now that you're here," he answers, honestly, dropping his shields all at once.  
  
His fingers aren't long enough to close around Sam's wrist, so his thumb ends up rubbing circles in the center. "Sam, you know I mean it all, don't you? I mean - I'm not joking with you." Dean swallows nervously.  
  
He's not sure why he says it, but they've been tiptoeing around it for days now, and he needs Sam to pick a side of the fence. He doesn't have much longer, so he can't give either Sam or himself the time they'd probably need in a normal situation to know each other and evaluate their actual chances. Dean chuckles bitterly at himself.  
  
Sam is completely taken aback. He stands there for a moment, stops his fidgeting and concentrates on the feel of Dean's thumb rubbing weakly at his wrist; Sam could break the hold if he wanted to, and it's... kind of heartbreaking. He hasn't thought about it a lot, what Dean was like before his weak heart got the better of him, but now he can't stop thinking about what they could have had if he weren't a doctor and Dean wasn't his patient. "I..." he starts, unsure of what to say. He looks down at Dean, so pale and fragile laid out on the crisp sheets, the ghost of his past self put on full display in his eyes, daring to hope. "Dean..."  
  
The door bangs open, and Sam jumps back, pulls his wrist out of Dean's grip and tries to look like he wasn't just contemplating what he was just contemplating. Jo's out of breath, clutching a piece of paper so tight it's crinkled in her hands.  
  
"Doctor..." she pauses a moment, crosses the room and pushes the paper into his hands. "It's straight from New York Regional."  
  
It takes Sam a moment to skim the contents of the fax, and then he draws a sharp breath. "They've... they've found a donor. They're waiting for the results from the National Donor List for this area - Dean, do you know what this means?"  
  
Dean almost whines when Sam pulls back from his touch, but then Jo is storming inside and his brain goes in overdrive.  
  
He freezes, and all he can process is _New York_ and _donor_.  
  
"Dean, do you know what this means?"  
  
And just like that, his brain gets back on track.  
  
 _Hell, yeah_ he thinks _I know what this means._  
  
He abruptly stands up on wobbly legs and slowly covers the short distance between his bed and the chair where his jacket is resting, batting away Jo and Sam's hands. He has to do this now, before the buzz disappears and he discovers he's too much of a coward to actually get through with this. True, Sam still hasn't given him a proper answer, but Dean's felt his pulse flutter under his fingertips and thinks _fuck it_.  
  
He scrambles in both pockets until he squeaks triumphantly and turns towards the doctor again. Without another word he walks up to the bed and falls on his knees in front of Sam, before opening his hand and Sam can see a silver ring on Dean's open, sweaty, slightly trembling palm.  
  
"I meant it," he states, his voice cracking a little. "Every word." Then his eyes shift away from Sam's face, too afraid of what he could read there.  
  
There have been few moments in Sam's life that have rendered him completely speechless. Most of them were too small to remember, or else so horrible he didn't want to, but this... This is something altogether different.   
  
Jo is standing right there (or maybe she's left; Sam's whole world has narrowed down to Dean's voice and the twinkle of the ring in the fluorescent lights) and this is grounds for canning. But after Dean gets his transplant, when he's well again, he won't be Sam's patient anymore.   
  
"Dean," he says, voice shaking. "Dean, get up." He helps him back into the hospital bed, tries not to make his heart work too hard, and can't stand the look of resignation written all over Dean's face. "Hey," he says, and turns to look around the room; Jo is gone, and Sam almost breathes a sigh of relief.   
  
"Hey," he repeats, closes his fingers lightly around Dean's fragile wrist. He barely knows the man, only met him a few days ago, but it feels like he's known him a lot longer. And if Dean can spice up even his dreaded visits to this ward...   
  
"I..." What does someone say to something like that? Sam never thought he'd be on the receiving end of anything remotely resembling a proposal; now he's stuck with nothing stored up to say. He settles for rubbing the blue vein on the underside of Dean's wrist, feels his pulse weakly, and tries to send a memo up that line for Dean's heart to just _hang on_ a few more days. "... yeah, I. I think I'd like that."  
  
Dean stares at where their skin touch. Then, he pinches himself, whimpers in pain and stares some more. Sam is still touching him and there's still that shy, incredibly beautiful smile on his face that Dean had never seen before, but now wants to keep staring at for the rest of his (suddenly long) life.  
  
Seeing him grin like that makes Dean finally realize how old the young doctor really is. He blinks, uncertain, before he grabs Sam's arm and pulls the doctor towards him with all the strength he has left: Sam doesn't expect him to do anything like that, so he stumbles and falls on him, just as Dean hoped.  
  
As soon as he's close enough, Dean closes the distance between them and covers Sam's lips with his own.  
  
Sam is thrown off balance and doesn’t even have time to flail before he’s toppling over and Dean is _kissing_ him. There’s a moment when he forgets why they shouldn’t do this, that Jo probably left the door open and his boss could be making rounds, that Dean’s heart is too weak to handle the strain.   
  
And it’s perfect.   
  
He’s had his fair share of kisses, but this completely transcends those. This is beyond anything, and it leaves him feeling light-headed; even though Dean is weak (and they should stop, god, they should before something bad happens) he gives Sam everything he has and Sam struggles to keep up and not get completely swept away.   
  
Finally, Sam pulls away. He’s out of breath and knows that Dean has to be worse. He looks over at the machine monitoring his pulse and it’s not bad, isn’t speeding like Sam expected, so he leans down and kisses Dean again.  
  
Dean welcomes Sam's weight against him and licks enthusiastically at Sam's lips to gain access to the wet warmth of his mouth; when Sam finally opens up, his taste explodes on Dean's tongue and it's intoxicating.  
  
Dean is instantly addicted to it, and his fists clench and unclench spasmodically on the covers until, with a leap of courage, he pushes his fingertips under Sam's cotton shirt.  
  
The contact with Sam's skin is electrifying.  
  
Sam jumps at the contact, Dean’s cold fingers pressed against his belly, and he whines into Dean’s mouth. His stomach flutters, explosions of butterflies and Dean’s touch sends shivers running up and down his spine. Sam grips the rail on the hospital bed with one hand and cups Dean’s face with the other. Stubble grazes his fingertips as he tilts Dean’s face toward him, angles them so it’s more comfortable.   
  
Dean’s fingers rove upwards, tracing a freezing path up the center of Sam’s chest and causing his breath to catch.  
  
Dean can't help the hungry noise he makes as he pets one of Sam's nipples until it's hard and begging for attention. He can feel Sam's heart thumping fast under his palm and it would make him smile if he wasn't too concentrated on the way Sam swirls his tongue like he's trying to _eat_ him.  
  
Dean's cock swells inside his hospital pants, leaking profusely and almost soaking through. All he wants is Sam's hand, right there. With the trembling fingers of his free hand, he pulls at Sam's wrist towards his groin, with a low growl in the back of his throat.  
  
Sam lets himself be led, drinking in the sounds Dean makes. And no, they can’t do this. Not here, but he wants, and Dean wants, and no one in the rooms around them are conscious enough to notice and Jo’s down the hall.   
  
He can see all the ways this could go badly, but the encouraging noises Dean makes as Sam rucks up the uniform hospital shirt are enough to banish them completely from his thought-process.   
  
The rail is in the way, but he’s worked enough hospital beds that all he has to do is fumble for the button on the underneath side and it collapses, taking his weight with it. He has to toss his hand out to stop from falling entirely on Dean, and at Dean’s petulant whine he returns it to its earlier position, pressing under the elastic of his hospital pants.  
  
Sam's hands are on him and it's like the world has stopped turning, and time's stopped ticking away. It's like nothing else matters but them, there, together. It's like he can't breathe anything but Sam...  
  
...wait a second. Dean can't breath _at all_. He breaks the kiss, gasping, as his face goes paler and his eyes snap open.  
  
_No, goddammit, not now! Fuck fuck fuck_ Dean thinks as the machine he's attached to starts beeping like crazy, which only serves to increase Dean's terror. He means to ask for help, but he can't. His lungs burn, his chest aches and Dean just wants the pain to _stop_.  
  
It takes a minute for the sound to filter through, but once it does Sam pushes away and takes so many steps back he distantly feels himself hit the window. Dean is gasping, trying to breathe at all and the sight is enough to take Sam’s breath as well, and it makes him take action.  
  
Quickly, he crosses back over to the hospital bed and calls as loudly as he can for a nurse. He talks, voice low, and he doesn’t even know what he’s saying but he has to get Dean to calm down some way. To take slow breaths and to get his heart rate to slow.   
  
Jo comes running with a new IV and they attach it to the line that’s already going into Dean’s arm.   
  
Fuck, Sam should have been smarter than this.   
  
He feels himself starting to panic, and that’s all Dean needs at this point; a doctor who doesn’t know what to do. Or is incapable of doing it.   
  
He stops himself, takes a deep breath and in a matter of seconds everything is completely clear. Dean is a patient, not… not _Dean_ , not right now. And Dean needs him to be the best he can be at what he does.  
  
So he is.

 

  
Dean’s finally back to sinus rhythm a half an hour later; he’s resting, and the room that was once such a flurry of activity is quiet. Sam knows he should get back to his rounds or his other patients are going to be neglected, but he thinks that with how close Dean came to having a heart attack, he can beg off for observation.   
  
He’s lost his coat somewhere; one of the nurses probably hauled it out without meaning to, so he sits on the edge of Dean’s bed in his scrubs. It’s cold, always cold in this ward and he shivers, but it has nothing to do with the cold.   
  
Dean’s face is completely lax, peaceful, and the lights have been turned down so the purple circles around his eyes are less noticeable. If he’d had a heart attack, with his heart in the state it was in, he would have… no, Sam can’t think about it. What Sam can think about is that it would have been his fault. If there’s any more long-term damage, if they have to wait for the heart any longer than what they already have… if Dean dies, it’ll be Sam’s fault.   
  
Fuck, he can’t let himself lose control like that again.  
  
Even as he watches, Dean stirs, starting to wake up; Sam wants to slip out before he becomes completely conscious, but he knows, even thinking about it, that he’ll be unable to.   
  
At least, until Jo comes in, quiet as a mouse (it’s got to be somewhere in the nurse’s training course about being absolutely quiet), holding out another sheet of paper. Her face is pale, either tired or scared or this is some very bad news.   
  
She doesn’t linger after she gives him the fax, but retreats down the hall to the silent nurse’s station. Sam skims the words and he feels his heart stutter. Thick bands constrict his lungs and he can’t breath, has to take short, shallow breaths because this is too much to handle all at once.  
  
 _No._  
  
Dean's eyelids flutter as he slowly opens his eyes. "Water," he croaks, feeling his throat as rough as if he had swallowed sandpaper, or- He blushes furiously as the image of Sam on all fours feeding him his cock flashes in front of his eyes, and he has to use all of his willpower to push the thought to the back of his head.  
  
He doesn't remember much of what has happened, but somehow he knows it must not have been very good for his health. Better not to worsen it, because who knows how much longer will he have to hold as they wait for his heart to get there?  
  
Just then he hears harsh breathing coming from his side, so he turns his head towards the noise, the effort evident in the way he scrunches his nose. "Hey, Doc," he calls in a whisper, because he still hasn't been able to drink and he really doesn't like to sound as if-whatever.  
  
Sam is sitting on the corner of his bed and looks like he's-trembling? "Sam?" he inquires, suddenly worried. "What's wrong? Talk to me." He seriously doesn't care about himself, he just wants to see Sam's smile again.  
  
Sam doesn’t want to look up, because he knows he can’t hide the fact that he’s trying not to cry. But Dean’s voice pulls at him, incites him to answer and Sam knows he’s irrevocably lost. He does look up. Dean’s eyes are a startling, glass-like emerald against his pale skin, against the circles around his eyes. Sam doesn’t want to worry him more than necessary, but this… he has to say something.   
  
“Dean…” he starts, looking back down at the fax he’s got crumpled in his hand. “There’s, uh. There’s a problem.” He can’t stop the way his voice shakes when he says it, not sure he wants to because this is huge and it’s not _fair_. As a doctor, he knows it is, knows the system doesn’t care that the patients are people, but. But this is Dean, and there should be some kind of…   
  
Dean blinks, so very tired by all the painkillers and the low blood pressure, but he fights to stay awake. Somehow, Sam is in pain and he owes it to him to be by his side. This man has saved his fucking life, after all. "Sammy?" he croaks, wincing a little at how hoarse his voice comes out ."Please? I'm freaking out, here."  
  
He leans towards Sam and pushes his forehead against his shoulder, trying to comfort him with the warmth of his body. He's so cold.  
  
Sam can’t look away from the crumpled paper, so he settles for closing his eyes instead. He clears his throat, trying to find some way to push the words out even though it’s the absolute last thing he wants to do. Maybe if he doesn’t say it aloud it won’t be true. And he wants this to last, but they can’t… and Dean has to know, and it’s either he tells him or Jo does.   
  
Sam would rather it be him.   
  
“It’s the National Donor List,” he croaks, and his voice is just a whisper even if he didn’t intend it that way. “You’re… there’s a woman seventeen seconds ahead of you on the list.”   
  
Dean can hear the distinct sound of his dreams breaking. Or maybe it's his heart? It's like looking at the scene from the outside, though, he doesn't really feel it. It probably hasn't sunk in yet, but he's going to die.  
  
After the attack he had this morning, this was pretty much his only chance. He'll probably cry over the life he'll never have and the old man he'll never get to become later on, when he's be alone.  
  
Now, though, Sam is his priority. Sam, who's breaking down on his behalf. Sam, who's his fiancé and a soon to be widow if he doesn't do something. "Look at me, Sam," he demands, his voice firm and resolute.  
  
He doesn’t mean to disobey, but it takes Sam a few minutes to get himself under control. Even at that he can’t keep his breathing steady, because there’s nothing he can do. He can try, has tried, has kept Dean alive this long. Without a donation, Sam is completely helpless. And it isn’t fair; he became a doctor to help people, and of all the people he’s helped, why can’t he help Dean?   
  
Sam opens his eyes and turns to look at Dean, and the level of obedience to this man he’s known for a matter of days would be frightening if he cared.  
  
Dean sighs. "Listen, Sam, I'm okay, really. Before getting here, I had already dealt with the fact that I wasn't going to come back out, so this doesn't actually change anything." He grabs Sam's hand (the one that's wearing his ring) and squeezes it a little.  
  
"However, _this_? This changes it all." Dean lowers his eyes and stares at the silver band, worrying his lip nervously. "I think-let's forget about this, okay? It was stupid. And irrational. And did I mention stupid?" He chuckles bitterly.  
  
"Seriously, I don't know what the hell was I thinking. You're a doctor and I'm your patient, that's all. You have a savior-complex and I have a hero-complex, so. Let's just ignore this whole day and let's move on, shall we?" His voice breaks a little on the last sentence, but he sincerely hopes Sam hasn't noticed.  
  
Sam stares down at where their hands are joined, at the silver band catching the low light, and _no_. That isn’t… this isn’t how this happens. Can’t be how it happens. And Dean thinks that Sam just said yes because Dean was getting the heart?   
  
That wasn’t even part of the equation at the time, at least not to him. “No,” he says, low, and swallows. “No, that isn’t—I don’t want to forget today. I didn’t agree to do this because you were going to get better. I mean, yeah, it was part of the moment, but…” Sam trails off, sighing, and gently takes his hand out of Dean’s grasp. “But if you really think it was stupid…”  
  
Dean cringes at how small Sam sounds, and he feels the worst scumbag on earth. He knows it. He knows it all. And still... he can't do this to Sam. Especially not if he cares like he does.  
  
"Of course it was stupid!" he exclaims, ignoring the way the machine beeps in protest. "Look at me, Sam, dammit! What can I give you?! I found the courage to come out and confess because I thought we had a shot… and we don't. I'm going to die, you know that, and there's no way I'll have you go through this. You didn't sign up for it, I did."  
  
His hands are trembling, tension running through his veins, and Dean lifts his frustrated eyes on Sam's face. ”I can't have sex with you, Sam. Hell, I can't even kiss you without risking it! What sort of life could this be?! Answer me." He's panting like he's run a thousand miles.  
  
It’s only then that Sam realizes how selfish he’s being. Dean doesn’t need the stress right now; Sam should just leave him alone and give him his ring back. He should, but he can’t. And maybe he’s the stupid one, because Sam doesn’t know how this happened. This morning he left his apartment looking forward to a normal, boring day, and maybe a better visit than normal to the observation ward.  
  
Tonight, he might walk back through the door a widower. Sam wipes at his eyes, takes a deep breath and raises his hands to hold Dean’s face between his hands.   
  
“I did sign up. I’m not quite sure when it happened, but sometime in the last week or so I decided that I was going to go through this with you. I—“ Sam stops, breathes again, and figures if he doesn’t say it now (even if it is stupid), he isn’t ever going to get it out. “I love you, Dean. And it doesn’t have to be about the sex, or, hell, anything.”   
  
Dean's eyes go wide. Is Sam seriously saying... "Do you mean it?" he asks, his voice back to a whisper. "Do you think-I'm willing to try. If you want to," he groans. "Fuck it, Sam, love you too. Never felt this way, and I know I shouldn't, but."  
  
He offers Sam a small smile. "You bring out my selfish side, I guess. And I want you here, more than anything."  
  
He shrugs, as a faint reddish color covered his cheeks. "If you ever said a word of this to anyone, I'll kill you," he mutters, his words betrayed by the soft light shining through his eyes as he looks at Sam like he's the most beautiful, precious thing in the world. Which, come to think of it, he probably is.  
  
Sam snorts, and how doesn’t know how he manages to find the humor in a situation that is at once doomed and so damn hopeful it hurts. “Yeah, right after you catch me,” he teases, entwining his fingers with Dean’s. It occurs to him how bare Dean’s hand looks, and despite the fact that this probably isn’t going to end well, Sam can’t help grinning like an idiot.   
  
Looks like he’s got a ring to buy.

  


  
Nurse Jo closes the door as quietly as she can, hoping the men inside the room won't notice, wrapped up in each other as they are. She smiles at herself as she slowly walks back to her desk, smoothing the corners of the page she's carrying.  
  
It's the third and last fax from New York, the one providing them with all the details, but despite how urgent and important it is, the nurse is quite sure it can wait. Once the doctor will come out of Dean's room and get to her to check on the other patients' conditions, she will inform him of the small helicopter coming their way holding Dean's future (and his own) in a small cryogenic unit.  
  
She will help him up as he sways under the weight of this life-altering news, and afterward she will probably accompany him to the closest jewelery store because yeah, you can't carry anything in an operating room, but Jo is somehow sure that for this sparkling new wedding ring they will make an exception.

 

  
_Castiel crosses his arms on his chest and arches an eyebrow. "What are you going to say this time, Uriel? They didn't engage in intercourse here, and they still found each other and bonded."_  
  
Uriel nods grudgingly, wonders in the privacy of his mind how long these idylls would work anyway. It's just the novelty, is just the connection they share in their blood that calls to them and forces them together.  
  
Yes, that must be it.  
  
Castiel lifts a finger. "One more time, Uriel. Just one more. The apocalypse is approaching, and we've lost enough time already with this."  
  
And Uriel knows Castiel thinks he's won, so he decides to take out the heavy artillery. There can't be no love without Winchesters, and no Winchesters mean no mud-monkeys to deal with.  
  
His plan can't fail.

 

  
**TBC...**


	8. ~ VII. 15% Concentrated Power of Will ~

  

 

_11th of October 2003 **07:15**_

  
  
It's Sam's first day on his new job. He woke up late, brushed his teeth so fast he wouldn't be surprised if a smudge of toothpaste escapes his quick check, and put on the buttery yellow tech shirt without ironing it first.  
  
He can almost hear the voice of his supervisor, Miguel Lecine, when he sees him: ìNot off to a very good start, _senor_ Wesson.î  
  
Luckily, he gets to the station in time to catch the train, thanks to his long legs that finally turned out to be useful for something else than tripping on his own feet and making a fool of himself, but he's not used to running anymore, so he's a little out of breath when he finally settles in a corner. The train is obviously filled to the brink, the cold and rainy morning discouraging people from using their bikes or just walking to their destination; Sam is still in awe at the number of bicycles in Madrid.  
  
He didn't expect Spanish people to be like that. Of course, his mental image of Spain being all about _corrida_ , _paella_ and _flamenco_ was probably a little stereotypical, but still. He has been living in Madrid only for a couple of weeks: the company contacted him through the Lawrence branch, and told him they were looking for a tech representative for the English/American market, but the office was in Spain because it was cheaper that way, and was he going to be okay with moving there?  
  
Sam had just finished college and he really needed a job, so he refreshed his high school Spanish and jumped on the new challenge. Right now, though? He's sort of regretting it.  
  
That's until the doors open and the most beautiful, perfect creature Sam has ever seen hops onto the wagon. He can't be more than 25, 27 maybe, and he's wearing dark jeans and a black leather jacket. His blonde hair is short and spiky, and there's faint stubble along his jaw; Sam stares so hard he can almost feel it tickle against his face.  
  
The man is sipping from a Starbucks cup, and when he curses out loud at his burned tongue Sam's heart does a leap in his chest. The guy speaks English, maybe he's even American.  
  
Sam thinks about crossing the wagon and approaching him with some sort of an excuse, just to get to know him, because this man calls out to him so loud Sam is afraid he'll go deaf, but then he looks down at himself and all the courage he was trying to manage disappears into thin air. He's not beautiful, not by a long shot: he's too tall, his mop of hair is unruly and unstyled, his arms and legs are too long and he's way too flaily to be even safe to be around.  
  
Maybe if he was a little smarter... not a geek, of course, just someone who could actually impress other people with his skills, or special in any way, with some sort of talent? That's not the case either, though.  
  
He's just a regular guy, intelligent and kind, but he'll never make the front page of a magazine for either his looks or his wits. He knows he's not that bad (he has had relationships, thank you very much) but he also knows that there is no way, no how he will ever be enough for _him_.  
  
And isn't that a depressing thought?  
  
The man saves Sam from his musings when he gets off the train and Sam realizes next stop is his own: he has been staring at _him_ for almost half an hour. Sam blinks, hopes _he_ didn't notice or think Sam's a creep, then chuckles to himself.  
  
Oh well, it's not like he'll ever see this guy again, after all.

 

  
_11th of November 2003 **07:15**_

  
  
As luck will have it, the guy takes the same train as Sam every single morning, and even if Sam knows it's unhealthy and pointless, he keeps getting on at the same time instead of acting smart and picking another one. It's only because it's the perfect time, really.  
  
Besides, it's already been established that Sam is not all that smart to begin with. Of course, once he knows at which time the train leaves the station, Sam gets there earlier and catches a seat quite often; despite being November, the weather is pretty good outside, so the train is not that packed, usually, and from time to time the guy gets to sit too.  
  
Those are the most difficult days for Sam, because fate plots against him and the free seat is always across from his. And seriously, how is Sam supposed to not look at the guy if he's at less than three feet from him?  
  
Despite him being a fashion hazard, Sam really tries now: he picks his clothes the night before, trying to combine them so that they will catch the guy's attention or at least they won't make him run away screaming, and yeah, he feels stupid sitting there, stiff, wearing his best shirt and doing his best not to stare.  
  
The guy is so gorgeous that sometimes Sam forgets where he is, too engrossed in how long his eyelashes are, or the way his hair curl at the nape of his neck when he turns to offer his seat to an old man standing next to him, who smiles gratefully. "So, what's your name, young man?" he asks, and the guy almost blushes, shifting his weight from one feet to the other, uncomfortable.  
  
Sam's heart speeds up when he hears his hoarse voice, thick with sleep, answering. "Dean, sir." The old man says something else, but Sam's brain is currently stuck on playing the moment on loop to focus. Dean nods his head, then turns towards the door, barely hiding a yawn.  
  
The glass fogs up, and Sam's stomach clenches once again as he thinks about how Dean will never be his. He feels his eyes sting and knows that there are probably tears pooling there, but he does his best to ignore them. He won't cry, especially not today that he was able to find out what to call the man.  
  
Dean.  
  
Dean, who is, probably, the love of his young life.

 

 

_11th of December 2003 **07:15**_

  
  
It's been two months already since that first morning, and Dean is riding with three more people the day it happens. One is a guy, who looks a little younger than Dean, one is old enough to be Dean's father and one is a young, lithe, blonde and pretty, and stands so close to Dean that if Sam hadn't seen her kissing the other guy as they got on the train, he would probably be burning in rage and jealousy.  
  
Okay, maybe he is, a little.  
  
They are all chuckling at something the young one said, when Dean stops, licks his lips and looks straight at Sam, who is caught staring. There's electricity crackling in the air, Dean lets out a shaky sigh and Sam knows he should look away, he just can't. He suddenly forgets how to breathe and he's afraid he's going to pass out, but then the girl pokes Dean in the hip and the moment is broken.  
  
He closes his eyes for a split second, and when he opens them again Dean's head is turned towards the girl again.  
Sam would think it'd all been a day dream, if it wasn't for the way his palms are sweating. Slowly, his heart gets back to its normal beating, but Sam can't shake off the feeling of Dean's eyes on him; they are green, so green, and Sam never noticed before.  
  
How could he? He tries so hard to only steal a few sneaky glances he never stopped on Dean's face before, not long enough to find out which color his eyes were, anyway.  
  
One of Dean's friends look over, arching an eyebrow, and Sam realizes he was still staring; he hangs his head down, as his cheeks get flushed, and shrinks in his seat as much as he can, hoping he will disappear. He's even trembling a little, unable to shake the connection with Dean away, but knowing he should, soon, before he makes a complete fool of himself.  
  
Well, more than he has already, at least; somehow, Sam gets the feeling he will hate himself before Christmas. Probably during, too.

 

 

_11th of January 2004 **07:15**_

  
  
Sam could date, maybe, it's not like he didn't get interest, after all, but he can't bring himself to do it. He tried it once, to just scratch the itch with someone else, but it was totally unfulfilling and he even felt sorry for the guy afterwards, which sort of defeated the whole purpose.  
  
Looks like he's destined to be a monk forever, and he's surprisingly okay with it. He has thought about it long and hard: why now? Why Dean? He doesn't even know the guy, maybe he's a complete asshole, or an homophobic idiot. Maybe he's straight, married, hell, maybe he even has kids.  
  
Sam lost himself imagining gorgeous babies with the same soft yet manly features more than once, and despite wanting Dean for himself he does think a little about what a waste of good genes it would be. Luckily for him, he's also selfish enough to decide he doesn't give a damn about the rest of the world and its genetics and goes back to imagining Dean doing dirtybadwrong things to him, which is marginally less creepy than thinking about Dean's toddlers.  
  
That's how Sam makes it through, as days pass by, piling up into weeks: making fun of himself and his stupid and pointless crush on a complete stranger he'll never have the courage to approach. The hardest time for him is during the weekend, when he doesn't get to see Dean and spend the rest of the day replaying the minutes they shared.  
  
In order to stop himself from stalking Dean's train stop, he walks around the city, keeping himself focused on something else and getting to know the place he lives in a little better. The trees are still bare, and they look so different from the explosion of reds and yellows Sam witnessed last autumn, but still they manage to be far from sad. Even they seem to have their own dignity and personality, in Madrid.  
  
Sam expected to see the snow, but found out by talking to his new colleagues, that snow is not that common in Spain; there's a pang of longing for Lawrence and his family, for a moment, somewhere in the part of his chest not filled with images of Dean, and Sam fights winter with the few pictures he brought along.  
  
Then he just waits for the spring and for the sun to start warming it all up: Sam is a weather person, he changes with the seasons and this year he has one more reason to want spring to come soon. The colder it gets, the more layers Dean wears, and even if Sam knows every single garment the guy owns, he wants him to go back to a threadbare t-shirt and his leather jacket, his favorite attire.  
  
He misses seeing Dean like that, comfortable and carefree; lately the guy seems to be bothered by something, and more often than not Sam has spotted him frowning and worrying his lower lip with his teeth. Yeah, something is definitely not right in Dean's life, and Sam desperately wants to solve whatever it is that is clouding Dean's expression.  
  
His friends haven't appeared in weeks, Dean has gone back to riding alone and sitting across the wagon, a pensive look on his face. Sam smiles to himself, even if it comes out a little forceful, and it's worth it to see the corner of Dean's mouth twitch. That night, all Sam dreams about is ways to see Dean's smile again.  
  
Maybe he'll get a full one, next time.

 

 

_11th of February 2004 **07:15**_

  
  
Dean didn't get off at his usual stop: he's still there, standing right next to the door, and Sam panics for a second. If he tries to exit from a different door, it will look rude, since he's right in front of this one, and after all the staring he has done during the last few months it would look a little obvious that he's just trying to avoid Dean.  
  
However, exit from that door means walking next to Dean, maybe even brush against him, and Sam feels light-headed at the simple thought. He's lost in his mind for a handful of seconds, and really, Sam should have learned from his mistakes. Never feel too confident, never lower the guard and most importantly never walk around distracted by something else.  
  
Apparently, though, no one ever specified how many mistakes it takes exactly in order to be able to learn, and he hasn't been a spaz in a while, so he's not expecting at all the way he trips on his legs as he tries to get to the exit.  
  
A strong arm grabs his bicep, effectively stopping him from falling on his face, and when the fingers curl around his arm his muscle twitches and Sam knows who it is even before he lifts his head.  
  
Dean is close, so close, and he's looking at Sam, worried. "You okay?" he asks, helping him up. Sam's heartbeat speeds up, and every second ticking by without Dean stepping back makes it worse. He swallows a couple of times, trying to clear up his mind because damn, Dean is talking to him and he has to say something, anything, dammit-  
  
"Y-yeah, I-I'm fine, thank you, Dean," he stutters in a whisper before his brain can catch up. Dean's eyes go wide and he lets Sam's arm go as if it burns, while Sam realizes he has just called the man by his name, which he's not supposed to know since they've never spoken to each other before.  
  
Fuck, Dean is totally thinking _Who is this creepy freak?!_ and Sam just wants the Earth to open under his feet and swallow him whole. He steps back, his legs trembling, mutters a _sorry_ and bolts, taking advantage of the doors opening that exact second.  
  
Sam runs to the office, away from the way he spoiled the only thing he has ever wanted, as his eyes fill up with unshed tears and his chest hurts. He runs as fast as he can, and his lungs burn, but he welcomes the pain. He just wants to die, because now?  
  
Now he can't ever see Dean again, and ripping him away from Sam's life is like cutting a limb.

 

 

_11th of March 2004 **07:00**_

  
  
It's been a whole month. Sam sacrifices fifteen minutes of sleep every morning in order to catch the train before his usual one, and it hurts like hell not to have Dean to look forward to, but he's coping, somehow: he dreams about him every night, anyway.  
  
It's so weird, he thinks as he walks into the station. He doesn't even have a picture of the guy, but if he closes his eyes he can see him, as clear as if he was standing in front of him. When he opens his eyes, he almost snorts because, seriously?Daydreams are one thing, but hallucinations?  
  
The Dean in his head is leaning against the wall, his arms crossed on his chest, and his face lights up when he sees Sam. Sam is so pathetic, and he shakes his head as he hops onto the wagon. Dean enters after him and steps closer, grabbing his arm again as if he wants to make sure Sam is real, and whoa, wait a minute.  
  
"Finally," Dean says, his fingers almost trembling. "Finally I found you." Sam's jaw goes slack and he can't do anything but stare, confused. What's going on? Dean clears his throat. "Listen, man, I don't know you and you don't me, but... I used to see you every day, and then you weren't there anymore, and-I missed you."  
  
Dean's gaze shifts from one side to the other, and he licks his lower lip nervously. "I've been looking for a way to approach you for months, but I couldn't find anything that didn't scream _stalker_ , so in the end I was just happy with staring from afar."  
  
Sam knows he must look like some sort of weird fish, but he cant help it. This man-this man wanted to talk to him? Dean wanted to know him? For _real_?!  
  
Dean probably misunderstands Sam's shocked expression, because he keeps babbling about how his friends gave up on him because he was so gone for a stranger he didn't even ever speak to, and the way he searched for Sam like crazy since he stopped taking the train. "I even asked to a couple of travelers if they had any idea of where you got on at, and I've been trying every day to bump into you... you must think I'm such a creepy loser, right?"  
  
The last words are bitter and self-deprecating, and that's what propels Sam to finally open his mouth and answer. "I've looked forward to seeing you in the morning since I met your gaze for the first time, Dean. When that old man asked you for your name, it made me so happy to know... it was like I was a little closer to you. I don't know what it is, but I feel drawn to you and I really think that there's something here."  
  
Dean's cheeks flush and he looks away, muttering something. Sam smiles softly, his fingers curling around Dean's on his arm and squeezing, encouragingly. "Ever since October," Dean says, still stubbornly looking away. "I've taken the wrong train to work every morning. I need to change afterwards and it takes me half an hour more to get to my garage, but it's worth it, because-because you are on it."  
  
He finally looks at Sam, his eyes shining, and Sam just stares back as an unknown warmth spreads in his chest. Dean's stop comes by, but Dean doesn't get off. "I'm walking you to work today," Dean states, and is Sam's turn to blush, as he nods, and the beaming smile he gets from Dean in exchange makes his breath hitch.  
  
The recorded voice announces Sam's stop as it has done every day for the last 6 months, but everything's different now: Sam's life has changed, and he feels like singing. Or flying.  
  
The 11th of March doesn't sound like a special date at all, but Sam knows that it will be, for them. It's the start of something big, he can feel it. Dean grabs his wrist, drawing lazy circles with his thumb, as the train enters a tunnel, and that's when they hear a sickening metal crushing sound and the lights go out.

 

  
_11th of March 2004 **07:37**_

  
  
"Dean?" Sam calls out, not freaking out yet, as long as Dean is still there.  
  
"I'm here," Dean answers, grabbing the lapels of Sam's jacket, and Sam lets out a breath he didn't even realize he has been holding. His fingertips search for Dean's face in the dark and when they finally find it Sam cups Dean's cheek, suddenly bold, to kiss him on the lips.  
  
It's a fleeting contact, can't even be called a kiss, but there's dread in Sam's heart and he just needs Dean to be close, with him, because something's about to happen and Sam doesn't want to miss a second of what could have been between them. "What's happening?" Sam asks, his lips tingling, and Dean tightens his grip on him.  
  
"I don't know," he answers, cradling the back of Sam's head with his free hand and pulling him closer once more. "Need you to-"  
  
He doesn't even finish the sentence before he's kissing Sam, deep and passionate, trying to convey everything Sam himself feels, and Sam kisses him back with the same intense desperation. When they break apart, panting and shaking, Dean rests his forehead against Sam.  
  
"I would have loved you so much," he whispers. Sam nods and closes his eyes. _I already do_ he wants to say, but he doesn't have the time.  
  
The last conscious beat of his heart is for Dean, though, even if he will never know.

 

  
**During the peak of Madrid rush hour on the morning of Thursday, 11 March 2004, ten explosions occurred aboard four commuter trains. All the affected trains were traveling on the same line and in the same direction between Alcala de Henares and the Atocha station in Madrid.**

**All four trains had departed the Alcala de Henares station between 07:01 and 07:14. The explosions took place between 07:37 and 07:40 in the morning.**  

 

  
**TBC...**


	9. ~ Epilogue ~

 

 

  
" **Enough**." Castiel's voice is low, commanding. There's something almost like a feeling curling through him, and if he were human, he might call it **rage**. Wrath is the closest thing he knows, that he is allowed to know. Uriel has gone too far. He believes this is a game, that nothing rests on the outcome but the resolution of their disagreement. But the Winchesters have a part to play in the coming war, enough of a part that sending them to their deaths and disrupting the Lord's plan is close to blasphemy.  
  
Uriel steps back, surprised by Castiel's reaction, and lifts his hands. "They are just human, Castiel! Human **sinners** , at that! Why do you care so much? Have you gone soft?" he spits, his voice defensive. He doesn't believe his superior has turned into this-this- **creature** who can't see far enough to understand that plagues like Sam and Dean Winchester are better off dead and buried than allowed to go around spewing their poisonous actions and feelings on the world.  
  
Not like he really cares about what happens to the world, after all, but it's the principle of the thing. He can't and won't admit that inferior specimens like those are the ones with the fate of their whole existence laying on their **incestuous** shoulders. Uriel grimaces at the thought.  
  
Life can't be so unfair, **God** can't be so unfair.  
  
"We've been over this countless times, Uriel. They are part of His plan, and we cannot question it." Has it not been proven, over and over, that the Winchesters truely do love each other? And love is a pure thing, the greatest of their father's creations. "We might not agree with their methods, but you cannot deny that they love each other. It isn't lust, it isn't perversion. They were created for this purpose." That is the end of it, because Castiel's point has been made and executed perfectly; there's no way Uriel can be blind to it.  
  
Uriel opens and closes his mouth, looking for the right words to say, but in the end he just clenches both his jaw and his fists and lowers his head. He can't deny what they have seen again and again: the bond between the Winchesters runs way deeper than he expected, and it could both be an asset...or a liability. Which one depends only on them.  
  
And their enemies, of course. He swallows and mutters something.  
  
"Are you conceding?" Castiel asks, grateful that Uriel is finally able to see that they cannot tamper with what the Lord has made. They are only warriors, and they are not meant to question orders, not as the Morning Star did. Perhaps he's been spending too much time with Dean Winchester, because he adds, "I believe that means I win."  
  
Uriel narrows his eyes and stares at Castiel, his expression dark and unreadable, but doesn't contradict him. It's not like he really has a choice here; after all, the Winchesters showing what filthy, sick creatures they are only gave him even more reasons to remember why he hates the human race so much.  
  
Castiel's lips twitch in what's the pale imitation of a smug grin, as the angel claps his hands together and stands up from the chair he was sitting in. "Very well," he says. "All that's left now it's to tell the Winchesters they have gained an ally in their crusade."  
  
And with a last glance towards Uriel, he's gone. As the flutter of wings fades away, Uriel smirks.  
  
If he has any say in it, the Winchesters will be each other's weak spot, and their enemies will take advantage of it. For a moment he feels almost sorry for stomping on Castiel's beliefs and good will, but they're at war and there are no friends or brothers or whatever it is that humans pretend to find solace in.  
  
Castiel simplifies too much: he doesn't realize that it isn't that easy. No matter how pure the love the other angel thinks he has spotted in the Winchesters, they are an abomination upon the Lord God, and if someone doesn't stop them they will turn into the worst scum that has ever set foot on the planet.  
  
Their father created these creatures, He even **loves** these creatures and no matter how much Uriel disagrees with Him, he intends to do something to fix it so that God doesn't have to cope with such a disappointment.  
  
**And if you stand in my way, Brother, I'll do something about you too.**

 

 

  
Castiel locates the Winchesters at a motel in Eastwick, Rhode Island. When he appears, they startle as they always do when he appears without first announcing his presence; they appear to be in the middle of one of Castiel's least-favorite human necessities, Styrofoam containers filled with food spread between them on the small motel table.  
  
"I apologize for the interruption. I promise it won't take long," he says, because he's learned that it's polite, and at their blank expressions, adds, "I come bearing a message from the host of Heaven."  
  
"... okay?" Dean says, and raises his eyebrows in an expression that Castiel hasn't learned to read yet. He thinks it means that he's supposed to continue.  
  
"I'm meant to tell you that God and His angels approve of your love, and that you will not be judged for the unconventional ways in which it chooses to manifest. That is all."  
  
With that, Castiel is flying, and a rapturous feeling envelops him. The love between the Winchesters has provided him with all the reasons to remember his faith in the human race; after all he has seen, it's kind of inevitable.

 

 

  
Silence falls on Sam and Dean, and it stays like that for a while. They don't speak, or eat, still sort of trying to understand what just happened. After a good handful of minutes, Dean clears his throat awkwardly.  
  
"So," he starts, without looking at Sam and not even sure why should he be ashamed.  
  
"So," Sam echoes, picking at his napkin.  
  
Dean has never been patient. "What the hell was that about?" he snaps, and Sam's looks up, almost offended.  
  
"Why am I the one who is supposed to know? You are the angel whisperer, not me!" he points out, and Dean rolls his eyes.  
  
"I'm asking you, college boy, because you always have all the answers," he explains, slow, as if he's talking to someone really stupid. "Man, that must come in handy for the Trivial Pursuit."  
  
Sam huffs. "How would you know that? It's not like you've ever played," he retorts, and Dean makes a petulant noise.  
  
They keep bantering like that until dinner is cold in their plates, and even though they're throwing insults at each other they have to force themselves not to grin, because this is them. This is something they know, something that will never change no matter how fucked up their lives are going to get with all the angels-and-demons crap.  
  
They know they can always come back to this, this intimacy of knowing how to hit each other's buttons and still be sure that the other will never really hurt them. Sam and Dean don't often think about what all of that means, or when exactly they stopped imagining the perfect girl to grow old with and started painting a future where the two of them are sitting so close their knees brush together as they enjoy a cold beer.  
  
It's a simple dream, probably even a little too simple, but for them it means peace, safety, home. They are each other's home, and everything else is just details.

 

**END**

**Author's Note:**

>   
> **Not Coming Down From:**  [bed](http://maps.google.com/maps?q=Bed)  
> 
> 
>   
> **Clawed Chained Heart:**  blah
> 
>   
> **Under The Spell Of:**  Fort Minor "Remember the name"


End file.
